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THE NORDIC THEORY
OF EVERYTHING
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THE
NORDIC THEORY
OF EVERYTHING
IN SEARCH OF
A BETTER LIFE
Anu Partanen
HARPER
An Imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
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Copyright
the nordic theory of everything. Copyright © 2016 by Anu Partanen.
All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book
may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission
except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
For information, address
Harper­Collins Publishers, 195 Broadway, New York, NY 10007.
Harper­Collins books may be purchased for educational, business, or sales promotional use.
For information, please e-­mail the Special Markets Department at
SPsales@harpercollins.com.
first edition
Designed by BTDnyc
Library of Congress Cataloging-­in-­Publication Data has been applied for.
ISBN: 978-­0-­06-­231654-­7
16 17 18 19 20 ov/rrd 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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CONTENTS
Prologue
1
One
In the Land of the Free: Becoming American
Two
The Nordic Theory of Love:
Pippi Longstocking’s Magic
Three
Family Values for Real: Strong Individuals Form
a Beautiful Team
Four
How Children Achieve: Secrets for Attaining
Educational Success
Five
Healthy Body, Healthy Mind:
How Universal Health Care Could Set You Free
Six
Of Us, by Us, and for Us: Go Ahead:­
Ask What Your Country Can Do for You
Seven
The Lands of Opportunity: Bringing Back
the American Dream
Eight
Business as Unusual: How to Run a Company
in the Twenty-­First Century
279
Nine
The Pursuit of Happiness: It’s Time to Rethink Success
305
Epilogue
331
Acknowledgments
335
Notes
339
Bibliography
363
Index
399
11
47
63
107
167
233
263
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THE NORDIC THEORY
OF EVERYTHING
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P R O LO G U E
B
ill Clinton was leaning back, gazing over the rims of his
glasses into space. One of his hands held a microphone, the
other hand was poised in midair with fingers spread wide. For a
brief moment silence descended on the packed ballroom.
When Clinton spoke, he addressed the woman with orange
hair sitting next to him on the stage. “There’s a huge debate going
on in America now,” he said. It was September 2010, nearly two
years since the financial crisis began. Clinton paused again, his
hand now falling and dangling. “About what it takes to be a
successful country in the twenty-­first century. This debate is also
going on in many other countries around the world.” Clinton
looked out at the audience. “There’s a lot of shaken confidence.”
Sitting on the other side of the stage from Clinton was a
panel of luminaries from the highest ranks of the American
elite. There was Eric Schmidt, the chairman of Google. There
was Melinda Gates, cochair of the multibillion-­dollar Bill and
Melinda Gates Foundation. And there was Bob McDonald,
at the time CEO of the multinational corporation Procter &
Gamble. But Clinton wasn’t talking to any of them. He was totally focused on the orange-­haired woman next to him.
“How would you advise p­ eople everywhere,” Clinton asked
her, “not to look in the past and blame the past, but just to figure
out—­wake up tomorrow morning and figure out—­what in the
living daylights are we going to do now?”
His focus growing more intense, Clinton swiveled his chair
away from the audience and pointed himself directly at the
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woman, his hand jabbing the air like a karate chop as he continued.
“How do we decide what government should do? What the
private sector should do? How to design a tax system?” He spun
back to face the crowd as he went on. “How to design our relationships with the rest of the world? How to define our obligations to poorer countries? How do you run your business? How
would you advise all these p­ eople to go back home and start?”
Clinton lowered the microphone, crossed his arms, and
peered over his glasses at the woman with orange hair.
“Thanks,” she said, giving Clinton a look. “Simple question.”
The crowd laughed, and then she began to talk, doing her
best to respond to Clinton’s daunting interrogation, to the worries and fears that seemed to be on the minds of everyone in the
audience.
It was a Tuesday morning at the Times Square Sheraton
Hotel in New York City, where the Clinton Global Initiative
Conference was under way. More than a thousand ­people from
ninety countries on six continents had traveled there to brainstorm ways to secure a better life for the world’s citizens in the
twenty-­first century. Many of the attendees were current or
former heads of state, business leaders, or executives of nongovernmental organizations.
When Clinton had walked onto the stage an hour earlier
to welcome the audience and commence the proceedings, he
looked well. He’d slimmed down a bit since his years as president of the United States, and though he was visibly aging, he
was dressed sharply in a patriotic ensemble of dark blue suit
with white shirt and red tie. Relaxed and confident, he had introduced the panelists, including the woman with orange hair.
He’d listed her profession—­like him, she was a president—­as
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well as some of her other activities, before getting to the part
that clearly animated him the most.
“And,” Clinton had said, this woman “has a country that
consistently finishes in the top five in all global rankings on the
quality of education, the way the economy works, the distribution of wealth, and opportunity.”
Those were accolades that, not long ago, might have been
associated with the world’s best-­
known and most robust
countries—­perhaps the United States, perhaps Japan, perhaps
Germany. But this woman, dressed in a simple beige pantsuit,
who’d been invited by the former leader of the free world to
share the stage with the globe’s most influential titans of technology, industry, and philanthropy, was Tarja Halonen, and she
was the president of a much more modest nation, tucked high
in the northeast corner of Europe next to the Arctic circle: Finland.
By then Finland had been garnering worldwide admiration for a decade, and now the attention was exploding. It had
all started with excitement over the educational achievements
of Finland’s children. On international surveys Finnish teen­
agers had ranked at or near the top in reading, math, and science from the year 2000 on. Delegation after delegation from
other countries had started making pilgrimages to Finland to
visit Finnish schools and talk with Finnish education experts.
Soon ­people around the world were talking about the Finnish
education miracle.
Then, just a month before the Clinton conference, Newsweek had published the results of a survey it had conducted of
nations around the globe. The magazine had set out to answer a
question that, in its own words, was “at once simple and incredibly complex—­if you were born today, which country would
provide you the very best opportunity to live a healthy, safe,
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reasonably prosperous, and upwardly mobile life?” It defined
five categories that measured national well-­being—­education,
health, quality of life, economic competitiveness, and political
environment—­and compared a hundred nations on these metrics. The result came as something of an unpleasant surprise
to the United States and other major powers that might have
expected to be at the top. Newsweek declared that for a person
starting out his or her life at the beginning of the twenty-­first
century, the best country in the world was Finland. The United
States did not even place in the top ten, coming in at number
eleven.
The accolades for Finland continued in the months and
years to come. The international lifestyle magazine Monocle
ranked Finland’s capital, Helsinki, as the most livable city in
the world, while the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Report listed Finland as the fourth most competitive
country in the world in 2011—­a ranking that actually went up
to number three the following year. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) declared Finland the world’s fourth-­best country for work-­life balance. The
European Union’s Innovation Scoreboard named Finland one of
EU’s top four innovation leaders.
The United Nations even set out to measure the seemingly unmeasurable: happiness. When, in the spring of 2012,
the World Happiness Report rolled off the presses, Finland had
achieved nearly the ultimate ranking, securing a spot as the
second-­happiest nation on earth. In addition, flanking Finland
in the first-­and third-­happiest spots were two of its close neighbors in the Nordic region: Denmark and Norway.
While gloom and doom rolled across southern Europe as
the euro crisis swept the land, the Financial Times published
a special report on Finland titled “Rich, Happy and Good at
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Austerity.” Meanwhile, there was one global ranking in which
Finland came in dead last: the Failed States Index. According
to the Fund for Peace, Finland was the least fragile nation in
the world. There was icing on the cake, too, when it came to
Finland’s international reputation: Probably the world’s most
popular mobile video game, Angry Birds, was the brainchild of
programmers in Finland.
Perhaps the biggest shocker, though, came in May 2012,
when a politician in Britain, which had long been America’s
oldest and closest friend in Europe, uttered a comment that
would have been unthinkable at any point in the previous hundred years: Ed Miliband, the leader of the British Labour Party,
was attending a conference on social mobility, where experts
butted heads over the question of whether ­people around the
world were achieving a better life than their parents. For decades, if not centuries, the country that had best secured a person’s opportunity for upward mobility had been the United
States. No longer, said Miliband. “If you want the American
dream,” Miliband quipped at the conference, “go to Finland.”
At the top of these many different rankings of competitiveness and quality of life, Finland was not alone. As with the
World Happiness Report, something good seemed to be afoot in
the Nordic region as a whole. Near Finland in the rankings
were usually some of Finland’s neighbors: Denmark, Norway,
Sweden, and on some measures Iceland—­a group of countries
often referred to as “Scandinavia,” but that, when including
Finland and Iceland, are more accurately known as the Nordic
region.
For generations the United States had inspired the world as
a model of upward mobility and high quality of life. But now
it wasn’t just British Labour politicians who were no longer
feeling so inspired by America. When Britain’s Conservative
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prime minister, David Cameron, was seeking ways for his
nation to support its families, increase the number of women in
the workforce, advance childhood development, and generate
greater overall well-­being, he didn’t turn to the United States.
Instead he looked elsewhere for inspiration and advice: the
Nordic nations. Soon Britain’s free-­market-­friendly magazine
The Economist was having similar inclinations. It published a
special report titled “The Next Supermodel,” exploring what
the Nordic nations were doing right in order to produce such
successful economies and societies.
Nordic culture had been attracting admiration, too, even
from within the United States. Sweden had produced the immensely popular musical act Abba, the best-selling crime novels
of Stieg Larsson, including The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, the
affordable chain store for sophisticated fashion H&M, and the
revolutionary furniture retailer Ikea, not to mention the evergreen auto brand Volvo. There had always been LEGOs, the
ubiquitous Danish plastic toy bricks; now Denmark was also
churning out first-­rate crime dramas such as The Killing, and
Copenhagen’s Noma was gaining a reputation as one of the
best restaurants in the world. By August 2012 Vanity Fair was
officially declaring what had gradually become apparent: The
world was experiencing a “Scandinavian moment.”
For me all this was more than a tad bittersweet. Back in the
year 2000, when Tarja Halonen had first become president of
Finland, I was a young Finnish newspaper reporter, fresh-­faced
and twenty-­five years old, newly hired by the largest-­circulation
Nordic daily newspaper, Helsingin Sanomat, located in Helsinki.
I was a Finn through and through—­I’d been born and raised in
the small, unassuming country far up north that now, all of a
sudden, had become the world’s darling.
But as the rest of the world was embracing Finland, I had
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done just the opposite. For me it was very much an American
moment. Just before Newsweek had declared my homeland the
best country in the world, I had decided to leave behind everything in Finland to begin a new life as an immigrant to the
United States.
From my new perch in America, I gazed back across the
sea at the Nordic lands that had been my home. Like a sports
fan rooting for her hometown team, I watched Finland’s performance in the international surveys and global rankings with
pride. At the same time I was distracted by the challenges I
faced in my new life in America. Around me, moreover, most
Americans didn’t seem particularly aware of, or interested in,
Finland, or its tiny club of Nordic neighbors near the Arctic
circle. Americans were too overwhelmed by the challenges of
their life in America. Maybe policy wonks like Bill Clinton and
the editors of The Economist had the time and energy to get excited about Finland, but really, what could a bunch of tiny, cold,
insignificant countries where everybody looks the same, acts the
same, and thinks a good time is a plate of pickled herring have
to offer the diverse and dynamic United States?
The United States had long been the world’s shining beacon
of freedom, independence, individualism, and opportunity.
Compared with freewheeling and liberty-­loving America, the
Nordic region could seem not only irrelevant but downright
awful. Not a few Americans saw the Nordic countries as a pathetic bunch of “socialist nanny states,” coddling their citizens
with welfare programs that weren’t building happiness but
were instead breeding dependency, apathy, and despair. American critics of the so-­called Nordic supermodel mostly talked
about the high rates of depression, alcoholism, and suicide in my
home country and its Nordic neighbors.
In the Nordic countries themselves, too, a lot of ­people
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weren’t sure what all the fuss was about. My fellow Finns, in
particular, are legendary for their low self-­esteem. When Newsweek named Finland the best country in the world, just about
the entire population of Finland assumed that the magazine
had made some terrible and very embarrassing mistake. And
the idea that Finns could be even the second-­happiest ­people
on earth struck a lot of p­ eople as ludicrous. With its long, dark,
freezing winters, Finland makes many of its citizens miserable
for sizable chunks of the year, and alcoholism is indeed a real
problem there. Sweden, Denmark, and Norway have tended
to demonstrate more self-­confidence than Finland and Iceland,
but none of the Nordic nations could be called a perfect country
by any stretch, and Nordic citizens themselves still often feel inspired by the United States, especially by America’s pop culture,
its entrepreneurial spirit, and its world-­class cities such as New
York, San Francisco, and LA.
As I settled into my new life in the United States, the American economy began its rebound from the worst of the financial
crisis, while back home in Finland, the atmosphere started to
feel ever more gloomy. The global recession and the eurozone
crisis started to weigh heavily on Finland, slowing the celebrated
Finnish economy. Finland’s schoolchildren were no longer
quite at the top of every education survey anymore, either, even
though they still performed impressively well. Overall, if you
asked Finns on the street whether their country was a “supermodel” for the rest of the world, let alone for the mighty United
States, their grumpy retorts, particularly if the weather was cold
and cloudy, would most likely be a resounding no.
Yet the longer I lived in America as a Nordic immigrant,
something became clear to me. Regardless of whether Finland
was the “best” country in the world or not, most p­ eople in the
United States, as well as many of my Nordic countrymen back
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home, did not fully realize that to leave Finland or any other
Nordic country behind and settle in America at the beginning
of the twenty-­first century was to experience an extraordinary—­
and extraordinarily harsh—­form of travel backward in time.
As a Nordic immigrant to the United States, I noticed something else, too. Americans, and many others around the world,
did not seem fully aware of how much better things could be.
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ONE
IN THE LAND
OF THE FREE
BECOMING AMERICAN
OPPORTUNITY
The bride to be was peering through the window. In my memories she is wearing white, but now that I look at pictures from
that day, taken some hours before the ceremony, I see that she
was in fact at that moment wearing black, and looking anxious. I remember her anxiety because the TV commentators
were busy interpreting every expression that crossed her beautiful face. They had little else to go on. All that was known was
that bride and groom would soon be getting married in front
of more than 150 guests at a castle in Italy. The camera crews
and paparazzi hovered outside, reporting as best they could on
the arrival of celebrity guests—­who was dressed in what, and
details of the menu.
I was watching from a hotel room thousands of miles away
in Boston, where I’d recently arrived to attend a conference. I
flipped through the channels. In addition to Tom Cruise and
Katie Holmes’s wedding, the news was reporting that the
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justices of the U.S. Supreme Court had received packages of
poisoned cookies in the mail. The sender had helpfully furnished each justice with a letter stating her intentions: “I am
going to kill you” and “This is poisoned.” That night at dinner,
a man from the conference who was standing behind me in
the buffet line asked me with a smile if I’d be kind enough to
taste the food for him, to see if it was edible. I assumed he was
making a joke about the cookies sent to the Supreme Court. I
promised to let him know if the food was poisoned. He stared
at me, confused. I tried to explain that I was referring to the terrorized justices, and he looked even more bewildered. Soon we
were both giggling in confusion. It turned out he hadn’t been
watching the news and didn’t know about the Supreme Court
and the cookies. As I sat next to him at dinner, we started to understand each other better. Two hours later, under the branches
of a big bush, we kissed. The next day I got on a plane for the
ten-­hour trip home to Finland.
My friends back in Helsinki were thrilled. You met an American writer! At a conference! So romantic! When they heard that
Trevor had called me soon after our meeting to announce his
plans to visit Finland to see me, the excitement turned to near
ecstasy—­now here was a real love story in the making! Trevor
did visit, and the visit went well. When our long-­distance relationship continued, and each rendezvous was followed by the
inevitable separation between continents, my friends started
sighing. Do you miss him terribly? You’re not too sad, are you?
I did like him. But I wasn’t yet convinced that I liked him
as much as my friends were convinced that I liked him. Trevor
had just moved from Washington, DC, to New York City, and
when it became clear that I might start visiting him regularly
in Brooklyn, my friends treated the whole thing as if it were a
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television romance. You’ll be just like Derek and Meredith on
Grey’s Anatomy! You’ll be like Carrie on Sex and the City! (Both
shows had been big hits in Finland.)
There was just one problem: I had no intention of moving to
America. Trevor felt like Mr. Right, but was I supposed to give
up everything I knew just because I was in love? At this point in
my life, I had explored the world. I’d spent two years studying
abroad, one in Adelaide, Australia, and another in Paris. As a
working journalist, I’d managed to visit six of the globe’s seven
continents, and had even seen the legendary New York City.
And what conclusion had I come to? That I wanted to live in
Finland.
As I’d worked at my job and traveled and read and lived
my life, I’d also decided that a woman is meant to be more than
a caretaker for her man and children. She ought to have her
own purpose, her own will, her own career, including her own
­salary—­as the British actress Helen Mirren once said, “The
greatest gift every girl can have is economic independence.” I
wanted to be a strong, intelligent, creative woman, not that girl
who surrenders everything just for a guy.
The longer Trevor and I were dating, the more heavily
this weighed on me. When our long-­distance relationship hit
the two-­year mark we counted fourteen round trips that we’d
made between our two countries so we could spend time together. He was becoming my best friend and true love, the one
person whose presence made all clouds disappear. How could I
throw that away?
It had become clear that if we were going to take the next
steps in our relationship, one of us would have to leave a life
behind, and there was a list of practical reasons why that someone would have to be me. Technically Trevor could have moved
to Finland. But he didn’t seem inclined to, and I had to admit it
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probably didn’t make sense. He didn’t speak Finnish, whereas
I already spoke English. New York is an international city, so I
had a better chance of finding work there than he did in Helsinki.
And then there were a few things about Finland itself that,
despite its overall high quality of life, I wasn’t sure Trevor could
handle even if he’d wanted to come.
I had always loved Finland. It’s a country of gorgeous summers
and quiet natural beauty, not to mention that Finland happened
to contain most of my friends and family, whom I adored. Finland’s location was convenient to other parts of Europe, making
even weekend getaways to places like Paris or Rome doable for
the average citizen. All that said, compared with any number
of places in the United States, Finland could also feel like the
small, cold, dark, and often somewhat monotonous place it was.
Finns have long been known for being modest, but extra modesty is not really required when comparing Helsinki to a place
like New York.
Finland had its accomplishments to be proud of, to be sure,
although the name of Finland’s world-­famous cell phone company, Nokia, tended to sound Japanese to most ­people. Perhaps
more distinctly Finnish were our designers and architects—­
Marimekko, Alvar Aalto and his famous chairs, and Eero
Saarinen, who designed the St. Louis Arch as well as Dulles Airport in Washington, DC, and the old TWA air terminal at Kennedy Airport in New York. Fans of classical music might know
the symphonies of our composer Jean Sibelius. And ­people who
watched Late Night with Conan O’Brien might even have heard
Conan’s frequent jokes about his own eerie resemblance to our
orange-­haired president. When you’re from a small country,
you take what fame you can get.
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But as Stieg Larsson’s Girl with the Dragon Tattoo novels
made so clear, the Nordic lands have a dark side—­and quite
literally so. After Trevor’s first trip to visit me, he boasted to
his American friends that during an entire week in Helsinki
in winter he’d seen the sun for just three hours. With so much
darkness this far north, many residents throughout the Nordic
region, at least those who can afford to travel overseas, consider
a midwinter trip to Thailand essential to their mental health.
Finns, in particular, also have a tendency to view life as a parade
of endless obstacles and disappointments, and to dispense with
small talk and niceties; as a result they can seem taciturn and
even rude to outsiders. I could imagine Trevor leaving the excitement and sunshine of New York City only to find himself
spiraling into a nightmare of dark and lonely depression caused
by my introverted homeland.
The more I contemplated the melancholy of the Finnish
psyche, it really seemed to me that the citizens of the United
States were the ones who deserved to be the best country on
earth, with their all-­American optimism, gumption, ingenuity, and knack for magically transforming challenging circumstances into profitable advantage. Indeed, I was almost too
embarrassed to tell Trevor my own story about the attribute that
we Finns seemed most to treasure and inspire in one another,
something we called sisu—­a quality perhaps best translated into
English as “grit.”
When I was ten years old, my family lived deep in the
woods. Like most young kids in Finland, my brother and I were
left to our own devices to trek the mile or so to school and back
every day. Often we rode our bikes, and sometimes we walked,
but during the long winters when the snow piled up too high,
there were days when we were supposed to ski to school. I hated
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skiing, so mostly I insisted on walking anyway. One evening
after I’d returned home, my mother asked offhandedly how the
walk to school had been that day.
I explained that at first the going had been a bit tricky, since
with every step I had sunk into the snow all the way up to my
hips. But I’d discovered that if I crawled on all fours I wouldn’t
fall through. After that the going was easy, I said, so I’d proceeded to crawl on all fours for much of the mile to school.
To my proud parents that was a sign that their daughter had
sisu. I could imagine the different story that a proud American
parent would tell about their child: The kid gets out of the snow
immediately, flags down a passing car, and deploys prodigious
charm to negotiate not only a ride to school but an entrepreneurial arrangement that leads to the kid becoming the CEO of a
million-­dollar snow-­shoveling business by age sixteen, featured
on the cover of Fortune. Come to think of it, compared with
America, what did Finland have that was so great—­anything,
really? Was there any reason not to leave?
I made a list of the good and bad aspects of moving to America.
The bad first.
In Finland, in the decade-­plus of my working life as a newspaper and magazine writer and editor, I’d lived a comfortable
middle-­class existence, as had all my friends. I’d always had
enough disposable income after taxes to eat out, travel, and enjoy
myself, as well as a nice cushion to set aside in savings every year
besides. I’d never had to pay extra for things like health insurance, and medical treatment of any kind had only ever cost me
small sums, if anything. If I were ever to get seriously ill in Finland, not only would I be treated at no significant cost to me, I
would also get up to a year of paid sick leave with job security,
and more help after that if I needed it.
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What if I were to have a baby or two? In Finland I’d be
eligible for a good ten months of paid parental leave for each
child, and without having to worry about losing my job while
I was away. My kids would then get inexpensive, high-­quality
day care. They could attend some of the world’s best schools,
all completely free, followed by their college educations—­also
tuition-­free.
And like most Finns, every year I took four or even five
weeks of paid summer vacation. Though our winters were dark
and miserable, our summers were glorious, and when it came
to summer vacation, our society, and our employers, considered
it important to our health and productivity that we enjoy our
time off.
I wasn’t exactly sure how all this would work in the United
States, but I had certainly gotten the impression that such givens
might be more complicated. Moreover, it wasn’t as if Trevor
was going to become my sugar daddy in America. His books
had been successful, and he had some savings, but as a writer
and teacher he couldn’t do much more with his income stream
than support himself.
And as I was contemplating all this in 2008, the collapse of
the investment bank Lehman Brothers set off a financial crisis
plunging the American economy as a whole into dire uncertainty.
But then there was the good.
Trevor was great. New York was great. The United States
had always been the land of opportunity. America was a wellspring of positive energy and creativity, the place that produced
so much of the culture that I enjoyed and lived with every day,
from the arts to goods and ser­vices to technology. I would get to
experience the most powerful country in the world firsthand,
and start a new chapter of life, away from the safety and com-
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placency of Nordic ways. I would be one of the huddled masses
yearning to breathe free, one more participant in the greatest
experiment on earth: building a truly diverse nation in which
­people from all over the world live and work side by side, united
by their love of liberty and the chance to excel. The American
dream was beckoning. And did I mention those Finnish winters? Or, more important, love?
I asked myself the classic questions: What would I do if
I stayed put—­same-­old, same-­old for the next thirty years?
Which would I regret more on my deathbed—­that I’d stayed
or that I’d left? I wasn’t a great romantic, but I wasn’t a great
materialist either. I thought of myself as a realist, and as a realist
I believed that on my deathbed I wasn’t going to be thinking
about safe paths chosen or acquired comforts held onto. I’d be
thinking about love lived, courage shown, and risks taken.
In November I quit my job. I gave up my apartment. I got
rid of all my possessions. On Christmas Day I said good-­bye to
my family and friends, and the next morning boarded a plane
for America.
ANXIETY
The onset was quick. The panic would seep in from my stomach, with burning waves making their way around my insides
while the pressure in my chest grew stronger. A band of dull
pain would wrap itself around my skull. I would gulp down
air in faster and deeper breaths, but still it felt like no oxygen
was getting in. With every breath I would hear humming in my
ears.
This was the second time I’d experienced a panic attack like
this. The first had been when I was hiking with my mother in
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the woods of Lapland in northeastern Finland, near the Russian
border. My mother had come up with an idea: We should bushwhack through a patch of forest, she suggested, to a cabin she
pointed out on the map. She said she’d been there once before,
with a group of friends, but I was not reassured when she revealed, cheerfully, that they’d only found it after being lost in
the woods for hours. We had no compass with us, but off we
went.
Sure enough, within two hours we were lost.
I could feel the anxiety spreading through me, and no
amount of reasoning could stop the physical wave of dread.
My body grew jittery and my mind rigid; I felt alone and in
trouble. Our cell phones had no signal, adding to the sense of
isolation—­I wondered if we should start building a bonfire to
summon help. I told myself to stop being ridiculous—­we could
not have been far from the marked trails, and we were enjoying
a beautiful, cool, clear autumn day—­but all I could do was pretend to act calm even though my stomach was churning inside.
The possibilities of what could go wrong filled me with dread.
We walked among the pines, passing the occasional reindeer, until eventually we reached a hilltop from which we could
see that the sun was already going down, and realized that it
would be setting in the west. We aimed ourselves accordingly
and soon encountered a fence that was marked on the map. In
no time we were back on the trail, right where we’d started.
The anxiety dissipated immediately.
I experienced the second attack of anxiety soon after I moved
to America. I wasn’t doing anything dangerous, yet the physical
feeling of dread was exactly the same. At first I thought I was just
stressed out by the adjustment to life in a new country. You have
to speak a different language all day, and you often don’t understand what’s going on around you, even in the most mundane
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of exchanges. But figuring out how to navigate America felt far
more stressful than my earlier experiences in other countries—­
despite the fact that it should have been easier, since I was older,
more experienced, and already spoke fluent English.
There were little things, like understanding how much
of a tip to leave at a restaurant or hairdresser’s, or learning to
order at Starbucks, which was more complicated than doing
my Finnish taxes. And there were slightly bigger, more mysterious things—­things about life in America that Americans
themselves didn’t seem to realize wouldn’t be the norm in many
other countries. For example, I tried to open a bank account but
I couldn’t understand all the different fees, no matter how many
times I read the brochures. I was undone by the flood of letters
that I received in the United States offering me credit cards,
and it was a mystery to me how I was supposed to be able to
afford the huge interest rates that were listed in the footnotes of
American credit-­card agreements. Or why, when I bought a cell
phone, I had to buy it from a carrier and commit myself to two
years of ser­vice, regardless of whether the carrier turned out to
be good or bad. In Finland cell-­phone companies rarely locked
consumers into this sort of straitjacket, and Finnish consumers
wouldn’t have put up with it if they had tried.
Then there was the matter of trying to get cable TV. After
arriving in New York I’d been hoping to subscribe to a c­ ouple
of channels so I could watch my favorite shows. In Finland that
would have been an easy, predictable, and affordable thing to
do. To find out how much it would cost me in the United States,
I looked online but got dizzy trying to understand the different packages and their pricing. So I called the company, which
made me feel like I must not understand English.
“So how much would that be?”
“Ten dollars a month. For the first three months.”
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“Okay, and how much after that?”
“I can’t tell you. It depends on the price at the time.”
“I don’t understand. Does the price change every day like
the stock market?”
“You’ll have to call us after the first three months to get the
price.”
“But you can’t just start charging me some random price on
my credit card that I haven’t agreed to, right?”
“You have to call us. Otherwise the subscription will continue automatically with the new price.”
The unknowable “new price,” of course, would be much,
much higher. It was all part of a way of doing things in the
United States that, as I would gradually realize, forced you to be
constantly on guard, constantly worried that whatever amount
of money you had or earned would never be enough, and constantly anxious about navigating the complex and mysterious
fine print thrown at you from every direction by corporations
that had somehow managed to evade even the bare minimum
of sensible protections for consumers. Things didn’t improve
when it came time to file my first tax return for Uncle Sam.
I tried to research my tax situation on the Internal Revenue
Ser­vice Web site, and was soon tearing my hair trying to comprehend the pages and pages of fine print and the endless exceptions and loopholes. In Finland filing my taxes had always been
quick and simple. But here in America, buried under IRS instruction booklets and terrified I might make some crucial and
costly mistake, I gave up and hired an accountant, something
I’d never had to do back home.
My spirits would fall even further whenever I read one of the
many magazine or newspaper features profiling superachieving, high-­earning Americans who rose at four in the morning to
answer e-­mail before heading to the gym at five and then hitting
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the office by six to get started on their ninety-­hour workweeks.
Mothers in America seemed capable of miracles—­returning to
work just a few weeks after giving birth, pumping milk between
meetings, and working at home on the weekends by managing
children with one hand and their BlackBerrys with the other. I
was certain I could never function at that level. The logical conclusion that began to settle on me was that I could never make
it in America.
Instead I became transfixed by the news stories I read about
another kind of American. These were citizens who’d perhaps
made one bad decision, or who’d had a bit of bad luck. They’d
fallen ill, lost their jobs, gotten divorced, gotten pregnant at the
wrong time, or been hit by a hurricane. They found themselves
unable to pay their medical bills, or their house was being foreclosed on, or they were working three low-­paying jobs and still
not making ends meet, or sending their children to a horrible
school, or leaving their babies with random neighbors because
they couldn’t afford day care, or all the above.
I also became obsessed with news stories about epidemics
in the United States of food-­borne illness, toxic plastic bottles
and toys, and antibiotics pumped with such abandon into farm
animals that we were all going to die from diseases that in the
recent past could easily have been controlled by those same
drugs. Sometimes as I sat on the couch staring at my laptop,
Trevor would pause whatever he was doing and gaze at me.
“You have that face again,” he’d say softly, lifting a finger to
stroke my brow. Without realizing it I’d begun squeezing my
forehead into a permanent frown.
After a while it was no longer a mystery to me why I was
endlessly panicked. Just as in the forests of Lapland, my brain
was processing my interactions with my environment, and the
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message it brought back was clear: I was lost in a wilderness.
And in the American wilderness, you’re on your own.
I blamed myself. Obviously I just wasn’t tough enough and
smart enough—­American enough—­for this exciting and dynamic country. My troubles were not that serious. Getting all
anxious about them, or about the possibility of what might
happen, was embarrassing. My mother would certainly say that
I had lost my sisu. Where was the girl who’d crawled uncomplainingly for a mile through the snow? More self-­reliance, less
whining, I told myself. More can-­do, less I’m-­scared.
With my confidence and self-­esteem under assault, and feeling the pressure to perform, I found it easy to start questioning things about myself, and about the part of the world that
I’d come from. I started to think the American criticisms I was
hearing of Nordic societies must be right. Nordic crime novels
and design trends might be popular in America, but many
politicians in the United States pointed to the way the Nordic
states coddled their citizens with indulgences that hadn’t been
earned, and in the process crushed anyone with even a shred of
entrepreneurial spirit. The result was nations of helpless, naive,
childlike p­ eople who lived in a state of unhealthy dependency
on their governments. Of course such a society would produce
a sissy like me.
For hours I would sit—­my forehead furrowed into that
frown—­
pondering my p­eople’s inadequacies and my own
weaknesses. Americans were often quick to point out that
Nordic nations had produced no Steve Jobs, no Google, no
Boeing, no General Electric, and no Hollywood. We were perceived as having little diversity and our GDPs were dwarfed
by America’s—­with the exception of Norway, which had oil—­
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and we possessed none of the most respected universities in the
world, none of the greatest innovations, and none of the wealthiest self-­made men and women. We weren’t risking our lives
and treasuries fighting wars that might need to be fought for
the benefit of all. We might be well intentioned, but we were not
exceptional. That is what America was. Exceptional.
I still thought Americans might be failing to appreciate some
of the good sides of Nordic life, but mainly I came to accept the
view that we Nordics just weren’t as competitive, creative, self-­
sufficient, or strong. Just a few months after leaving Finland,
I’d gone from being a successful and happy career woman to an
anxious, wary, and self-­doubting mess.
As I got to know my new acquaintances in the United States
better, however, I was surprised to discover that many of them
suffered from anxiety just as severe as mine—­or worse. It
seemed that nearly everyone was struggling to cope with the
logistical challenges of daily life in America. Many were in therapy, and some were on medication. The National Institute of
Mental Health (NIMH) estimated that almost one in five adult
Americans suffered from an anxiety disorder, and the most commonly prescribed psychiatric drug in the country—­alprazolam,
known to many Americans as Xanax—­was for treating anxiety.
Soon I didn’t feel so alone, or so crazy. This may sound
strange, but imagine my relief when I heard about a study conducted in 2006 by a life insurance company in which 90 percent
of the American women surveyed said that they felt financially
insecure, while 46 percent said that they actually, seriously,
feared ending up on the street, homeless. And this last group
included almost half of women with an annual income of more
than one hundred thousand dollars a year. If American women
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making more than one hundred thousand dollars were afraid
of ending up in the gutter—­and this study had been conducted
even before the financial crisis—­then perhaps I was channeling the same unease that Americans themselves were feeling in
droves. The difference was that for me, the fear was brand-­new
and strange, while for them it was just life. So maybe I had it
backward. Maybe I wasn’t racked by anxiety because I came
from a foreign country. Maybe I was racked by anxiety because
I was becoming an American.
As the months passed and I did my best to settle in and
learn to live with this uncertain new existence, it seemed that
all around me Americans were becoming more unsettled, more
unhappy, and increasingly prone to asking what was wrong
with their lives and their society.
Since I’d arrived in the United States a ­couple of months
after the Wall Street collapse, ­people were talking more and
more about the huge gap between the very rich in America
and the rest of us, and about stagnation in the incomes of the
middle class. Politicians were also fighting, of course, over what
to do—­if anything—­about the tens of millions of Americans
who lacked health insurance. In the meantime the nation was
buckling under the astronomical costs of medical care, burdening everyone else. At parties or get-­togethers, a frequent topic of
conversation was the fights that p­ eople were having with their
health-­insurance companies.
Lots of ­people were also discussing how America could improve its failing schools. I read about poor families trying to get
their children out of terrible schools and into experimental ones
that might be better. Well-­to-­do families were competing ever
more fiercely, and paying ever-­larger sums, for coveted spots at
good schools, and at the same time competing ferociously in the
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workplace for the salaries they needed to pay the out-­of-­control
expenses of not only private schools but also of college down the
road.
The American dream seemed to be in trouble.
Unprepared for all this, I struggled to reconcile myself to it
all—­to my new home, to the excitement of this country’s possibility, but also to the intense anxiety and uncertainty that America wrought, on me and seemingly most everyone I met.
Which was about the time that Trevor asked me to marry
him.
Officially we were wed on a crisp December day at City Hall in
Lower Manhattan, with Trevor’s best friend and his wife as our
witnesses, followed by champagne on the Brooklyn Bridge. The
following summer we staged a modest wedding party back in
Finland to celebrate with our families and friends. On a beautiful August afternoon filled with bright sunshine we said our
vows in a birch grove by the sea in Helsinki.
Just as we were leaving Finland and returning to our anxiety-­
filled lives in America, the late-­August 2010 issue of Newsweek
hit the stands. The cover was a swirl of flags of different countries around the world. In the center of the vortex was a teaser
reading, “The Best Country in the World Is . . .” The winner, I
quickly learned, was the country I had just given up.
I sat on my couch back in the United States and read about
the advantages of Finland I’d chosen to forsake. While my
fellow-­American inhabitants and I were increasingly stressed
out, overworked, unhealthy, underpaid, insecure, and uncertain
whether our children’s lives would be any better, back home in
Finland the middle-­class friends I’d left behind were enjoying
a healthy work-­life balance, enough free time and disposable
income for truly rejuvenating vacations, and a universal and
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affordable health-care system good enough not only for Finns,
but apparently also for the global soccer star David Beckham.
When Beckham had torn his Achilles’ tendon a few months
earlier, of all the best doctors around the world—­including the
United States—­that he could have gone to see, he’d chosen to fly
to Finland for his surgery.
Many of my friends in Finland were having kids, and while
bringing up children is never easy, their family lives sounded to
me surprisingly sane, helped along by the sorts of things Newsweek noted: long parental leaves, easily affordable day care, and
an excellent public education system. According to Newsweek,
a young person’s chances of enjoying a good quality of life were
better in Finland than anywhere else on the planet.
Nothing about the Newsweek survey inspired me to ditch my
newfound admiration for the United States. But it did give me
back something very important that I’d lost: self-­confidence. It
also pushed me to compare other aspects of my life in America
with life back home. And as I did, I began to wonder if Newsweek
had simply scratched the surface of a much more important story.
DEPENDENCY
Since the dawn of the modern era, people have been lamenting
the way modern life uproots the traditional support structures
of society, most especially family and community, leaving insecurity and anxiety in their place. Back in the days when several
generations lived together under one roof, sharing chores and
domestic duties, surrounded by a tight-­knit village where everyone knew one another and pitched in, a person could feel secure—­at least when it came to the sorts of problems that family
and neighbors could help you solve. Day-­to-­day life was likely
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to be relatively predictable, and you might well die in the town
where you were born, surrounded by the same p­ eople you’d
known all your life. For the most part in modern societies, those
days are considered long gone.
On the other hand, modernity had brought some tremendous improvements to human existence, and I certainly felt that
many of them were on especially splendid display in America.
Indeed, perhaps the biggest benefits of modernity were also
some of the most cherished and fundamental principles of the
United States: freedom, independence, and opportunity. ­People
around the world had long looked to the United States as the
champion of these core modern principles. Most ­people, including myself, assumed that part of what made the United States a
great country, and such an exceptional one, was that you could
live your life relatively unencumbered by the downside of a traditional, old-­fashioned society: dependency on the p­ eople you
happened to be stuck with. In America you had the liberty to
express your individuality and choose your own community.
This would allow you to interact with family, neighbors, and
fellow citizens on the basis of who you were, rather than on
what you were obligated to do or expected to be according to
old-­fashioned thinking.
The longer I lived in America, therefore, and the more
places I visited and the more p­ eople I met—­and the more
American I myself became—­the more puzzled I grew. For it
was exactly those key benefits of modernity—­freedom, personal
independence, and opportunity—­that seemed, from my outsider’s perspective, in a thousand small ways to be surprisingly
missing from American life today. Amid the anxiety and stress
of ­people’s daily lives, those grand ideals were looking more theoretical than actual.
This wasn’t just in New York City, nor was it limited to
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certain social classes. As I ventured beyond New York to rural
Maine, to Washington, DC, to small-­town Ohio, to southern Virginia, to the West Coast, what struck me was not that
­people felt they had a great deal of freedom, or could fully be
individuals, or enjoyed a fair shake at success. Rather, in order
to compete and to survive, the Americans I encountered and
read about were being forced to depend more and more on one
another, in a throwback to the traditional relationships of old.
And in the process, individuals were becoming beholden to
their spouses, parents, children, colleagues, and bosses in ways
that constrained their own liberty. The demands and tensions
caused by this state of affairs seemed to be making everyone’s
stress and anxiety even worse—­even in the areas of life that they
cherished the most, such as right at home, in the family.
One of the things I most came to admire after moving to the
United States was the way American families did things together, stuck up for one another, enjoyed one another’s company, and entertained a certain amount of discussion and
democracy among its members. I loved the way young and old
were not separated into rigid, distinct, and mutually incomprehensible worlds that overlapped only when parents issued
orders. American families in the twenty-­first century, it seemed
to me, managed to be admirably wholesome and progressive at
the same time.
American parents clearly spent a lot of time with their
children and gave them plenty of love, attention, and encouragement, and this seemed identical to what my friends and acquaintances back in Finland were doing. Both my American
and Finnish friends with children shuttled their kids to music
lessons and soccer practice, bought them toys, read books with
them, and posted pictures of them on Facebook.
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And yet the differences nagged at me. When I visited someone’s home in the United States, I couldn’t shake a strange sensation that I had never quite had back in Finland: that somehow
the children were taking over their parents’ lives. As usual I
blamed myself for being a stodgy, closed-­minded Nordic, inadequate to the cutting-­edge innovations of American life.
As I struggled to understand my vague sense of confusion
about this, I also met many American parents who felt they
needed to direct all of their young children’s playtime toward
activities that were productive, educational, and goal-­oriented.
This, I realized, was related to the race to steer even toddlers
toward a good school, as early as possible. At what cost, I wondered, to a child’s creativity? And later in a child’s young career,
I heard about schoolteachers who discovered that a mom or dad
was the one doing much of a student’s homework. Again, this
was in order to secure the good grades that would become critical when trying to find a better school or apply to college. What
kind of dependency, I asked myself, did that instill in a child?
When the college race rolled around, anxious American parents were forced to micromanage the ever m
­ ore ­cutthroat application process, too. Then, because college was so expensive, once
their child was accepted, many parents still spent large sums on
tuition, room and board, and health insurance, and maybe even
furnishings and a car. It was only natural that in return for all
this, some parents expected frequent reports from their children
about their activities, even as their children were leaving home
and trying to forge their own adult identities. I read about university students who remained tethered to their parents through
texting exchanges and phone chats several times a day.
At the lower end of the income spectrum, teenagers were
losing out on college opportunities because their parents didn’t
know how to manage the application process. Among the few
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underprivileged students who had, against the odds, been accepted to a good college far from home, many dropped out, feeling they needed to be closer to their families.
I was surprised by how frequently I heard even grown
adults in the United States say that their parents were their best
friends. This level of dependency among older children on their
parents was almost unheard of back in Nordic countries.
And then came the kicker. In America, after children grew
into adults with their own children and responsibilities, the co­
dependent child-­parent relationship seemed to flip 180 degrees.
I met middle-­aged adults overwhelmed by the enormously
time-­consuming and expensive burden of micromanaging the
lives of their elderly parents. They were strung out by the tasks
of coordinating medical care and treatment, and handling the
logistics, and often the costs, of bills and insurance, on top of
trying to juggle their own careers and parenting their own kids.
In Finland this kind of dependency was unheard of. Of course
my Finnish acquaintances back home visited their aging or
ailing parents regularly and helped them with small tasks, but
being saddled with the kind of caretaker duties Americans were
involved with was, in most cases, unimaginable.
My own parents in Finland, both well-­educated urban professionals, had always been supportive of me, but they had also
made a point of letting me manage my own affairs from an
early age. When I was nine and came up with the idea of learning to ride horses, I looked up local stables in the yellow pages
and called to book a lesson myself. Then I phoned my mother
at work and asked if she would pay for it, and she agreed—­
and that was how things usually went. Once I’d begun regular
riding lessons, my parents occasionally drove me to the stables,
but mainly I rode my bike or took the bus. When I turned seventeen, I traveled alone with a friend to Amsterdam. At the
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age of eighteen I became, as all Finnish eighteen-­year-­olds do,
very much an adult in the eyes of society and the law. When I
selected my university major—­journalism—­I barely discussed
it with my parents. After all, I had left home, and my parents
weren’t paying my college tuition.
The Finnish approach to parenting that I’d grown up with
was by no means perfect. In some families it could erect a wall
of stoicism between children and adults, where asking for help
was considered a sign of weakness. Perhaps as a result, Finnish
parents today have gotten more involved in their children’s everyday activities compared with when I was a kid. Personally,
I’d always had a warm relationship with my mother and father,
and I’d always been able to count on their help if I needed it. But
very much on purpose, they had also not been intimately involved
in managing many of the important decisions in my life. For the
most part my Finnish acquaintances had also grown up with a
similar degree of affection for their parents, while developing a
considerable degree of independence from them early on as well.
I soon discovered that my apprehension about certain aspects of American family life was entering the zeitgeist. Experts on childhood development were pointing to the dangers
of “helicopter parenting,” noting the difficulties that young
adults often encountered establishing themselves as individuals after their parents had cushioned them from failures and
made decisions for them for two decades or more. Television
shows such as HBO’s Girls were making comedic hay from
such problems—­the series begins when Hannah, a twenty-­
something writer, hears that her parents are finally going to cut
her off, after having supported her all the way through college
and for two additional years after graduation. More seriously,
Americans were increasingly worried about the potentially deleterious long-­term effects that dependence on overinvolved par-
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ents might cause a person later in life—­“How to Land Your Kid
in Therapy” warned one widely read cover story in the Atlantic.
The pharmaceutical industry was doing its part, raking in profits from sales of antianxiety and antidepressant drugs.
As I compared my friends in Finland and America, I realized that a simpler style of parenting—­one that would let
kids make mistakes and develop independence, that would let
them find and pursue opportunity themselves—­was a luxury
that many American families simply felt they could not afford.
In America the primary factor in achieving the possibility of a
stable middle-­class existence seemed to boil down to one thing:
having proactive, tireless, micromanager parents. It was a recipe
not for raising independent children well equipped to handle
the challenges of modern life for themselves, but rather for
raising children handicapped by an almost premodern form of
dependency. Yet the root of the trouble did not seem to be emotional or psychological at all, but rather structural—­the result of
such problems as failing public schools and soaring college costs.
Ditto when it came to grown children having to take care of
their aging parents. In the United States, it was nearly impossible to get good-­quality, inexpensive senior care. So adults were
overburdened with the task of caring for their own parents.
I didn’t have kids of my own yet, and my aging parents were
back in Finland, so for the moment I was free simply to contemplate the remarkable differences in these relationships between
the two countries. But there was a second kind of relationship
that I was personally participating in by now that also made life
in America radically different from life in Nordic countries: the
relationship between women and men.
I’d grown up inspired by the example of strong American
women—­politicians, artists, authors—­who were true to them-
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selves rather than just devoted to finding and pleasing a man.
When I’d needed a boost to pursue a goal at the office, or to
stick up for myself in a relationship or social situation, I’d found
encouragement reading the work of American women writers.
After moving to New York I hadn’t always felt comfortable
among the perfectly manicured, high-­heeled, well-­toned, and
fashionably dressed power ladies of Manhattan—­I’d been accustomed to more understated appearances back in oversensible
Finland. But during a stint working in the Manhattan offices of
a major finance magazine, I did find myself in awe of the can-­do
attitude and bold resolve of the American women around me.
There was a flip side, however. Once I’d settled in the United
States myself, I began to experience some confusion about my
new life as a woman in America, especially when it came to the
question of getting married, and the nature of the relationship
between spouses.
I’d been watching American TV shows and movies for a
long time, and I’d gotten used to seeing women obsessed with
locking in the perfect marriage. The first American soap opera
was finally beamed into Finnish living rooms in the early
1990s—­The Bold and the Beautiful. It was an immediate sensation, so much so that Finns started naming their newborns
Ridge and Brooke. The show’s impact for me was learning two
new English words. The first was “commitment,” the thing that
women on the show demanded endlessly from their men. The
second word I learned was “libido,” the thing that other characters on the show used to explain why for the dreamy men,
“commitment” would always be impossible.
Nevertheless the women’s persistence was sometimes rewarded when one of the men offered up a sparkling diamond
ring, usually immersed in a flute of champagne. (This always
struck me as risky. Since Nordic winters are so long, dark, and
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cold, even the daintier ladies among us are not above snatching up the nearest alcoholic beverage and chugging it without a
second thought.) Among my friends and me, the English word
“commitment” became a kind of oversize caricature of what
we should hope for from a man. We’d say it with soap-­opera
gravitas in our best imitation of an American accent, then collapse into laughter. Later I watched the women on Ally McBeal
and Sex and the City do their best to reel in a man, too, though
the tone of those shows was a tad more sophisticated. After that
their place was taken by the bridezillas of American reality TV.
These women depicted on screen were an exaggeration,
of course, but after I moved to the United States, it gradually
dawned on me that the quest for the ideal man hadn’t been exaggerated as much as I’d thought. In real-­life America, commitment was important, and the perfect husband would, needless
to say, also be handsome, kind, romantic, trustworthy, hardworking, and good with kids. But after living in America for
a while, I realized there was an undercurrent to the quest for
commitment that I hadn’t noticed before—­even though, I now
realized, there had been plenty of evidence for it on Sex and the
City. In the United States, when a woman sought commitment
from a man, there was often an implicit or explicit understanding that what she was looking for was someone who, perhaps
even over other qualities, was well paid.
The first visible hint of this was the diamond engagement
rings worn by American women. Even Trevor, my low-­paid
writer-­teacher American boyfriend, had proffered a diamond
engagement ring when he popped the question. He’d been
lucky—­he’d inherited the ring from his grandmother. With a
small diamond flanked by two opals, it was the most beautiful
thing I’d ever owned. Truly a token of his love, it made my heart
swell. But my feelings for the ring were mixed. Where I came
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from, engagement rings were usually nothing more than simple
gold bands worn by both the man and the woman, like American wedding rings. Only later, at the wedding itself, might the
man give the woman a second ring, perhaps with some stones,
though rarely would it contain anything as pricey as a diamond.
When I wore my diamond engagement ring from my American
fiancé, sometimes I felt embarrassed to be wearing something
so expensive in plain sight. But more to the point, I wondered
why the symbol of our future matrimony had to be a display of
money. And why should it display not my financial power, but
his? Rubbing my fingers on the smooth opals and sparkling diamond, I felt like Gollum in The Lord of the Rings, both loving
and hating this precious thing.
Not all American marriages were stories of grateful women
marrying rich men, of course. Yet the American reality was that
getting married was still understood as an act of financial commingling. For proof of this one needed to look no further than
the first few lines of a typical U.S. tax return. The IRS rewards
married c­ ouples for pooling their incomes and filing their taxes
as a joint unit. This is a startling practice to anyone from Finland, where each individual is always taxed independently—­
marital status has nothing to do with paying your taxes. The
Finnish approach is deliberate; each spouse can easily track exactly what he or she has individually earned and paid, and contributed to the family, and everyone is taxed similarly without
regard to their relationship status. Indeed, in Finland, a policy
like America’s would be considered government meddling in
matters of private morality. By mixing American spousal finances even more tightly together into a muddled knot, the
effect of this IRS-­inspired commingling is to promote further
financial interdependence between spouses.
Just as in the relationships I’d observed between parents
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and children in the United States, the unspoken dependencies built into these financial bonds between married men and
women struck me as peculiar remnants of a bygone era. It was
as if America, land of the Hollywood romance, was in practice
mired in a premodern time when marriage was, first and foremost, not an expression of love, but rather a logistical and financial pact to help families survive by joining resources. That, of
course, begged the question of why such an old-­fashioned pact
might be necessary in what was supposed to be one of the most
modern countries on earth.
I gradually discovered that again I wasn’t the only one wondering what was wrong with marriage in America. Among
well-­educated women, for example, there was more and more
talk—­some of it in the form of several widely read magazine
articles—­about the increasing difficulty of finding a man worth
marrying: a man of equal or preferably higher stature in education, social status, and salary. Successful career women who’d
labored hard to secure a degree from a brand-­name college or
graduate school, and who themselves might already have landed
a high-­profile job, wondered whether they’d now have to settle
for a spouse with lesser qualifications, status, and income.
Among the less privileged, meanwhile, American marriage
appeared to be in a state of full-­blown crisis. A much-­discussed
study had found that among white p­ eople in their thirties and
forties, less than half of those with only a high-­school education
were tying the knot. Critics debated the causes of this reality,
but what was remarkable to me was that this discussion, too,
ultimately circled around the financial axis—­whether the men
were suffering from a lack of paychecks, or the women from
an abundance of welfare checks. In all these cases the problems, and the possible solutions, seemed peculiarly linked to a
­couple’s, or a family’s, income—­traditionally the husband’s, but
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now sometimes the wife’s—­which then became the glue that
held marriages together, or alternatively, the wedge that drove
them apart.
From a Nordic point of view all this was extremely peculiar. I’d always thought of a romantic relationship between
two ­people as a union of equal partners, lovers, and friends—­
and never as a financial arrangement. This wasn’t just naïveté.
When I was growing up in Finland, my father advised me to
choose a profession that would pay well, but never once did
he suggest that I find a husband who would be well paid. My
mother, for her part, had set a clear example ever since I can
remember—­she was a dentist who had her own clinic, and
she’d made good money throughout my childhood. As for my
Finnish friends and I, we never sat around discussing what sort
of salaries we hoped for in a spouse. Finances seldom came up
as a factor in the marriage equation. P
­ eople generally assumed
that both partners would have jobs, but that was about it.
However, now that I was a woman in America—­a woman
who didn’t make a lot of money herself, and who had just
married a man whose income was also relatively modest—­I
realized that all this consideration of marriage as a financial arrangement did indeed have a certain compelling, if sad, logic.
In America, if you were contemplating getting married and
starting a family, you first needed to think very carefully about
your finances. How much debt did you have in student loans?
Could you afford health insurance? For that matter, how much
would it cost just to give birth? The maternity benefits of different health-­insurance plans varied dramatically. I was stunned
when I learned of a young ­couple who had health insurance,
and nevertheless had ended up owing the hospital twenty thousand dollars for the birth of their baby.
Then there was trying to care for a baby once it was born.
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Under American law, companies with fewer than fifty employees weren’t required to grant any parental leave at all; if you
were a woman who wanted to care for a newborn, you might
actually have to quit your job. Then who would pay the bills?
Larger companies had to grant only three months of maternity
leave, and likewise, that was unpaid. Some employers might
offer more generous benefits, but generally speaking prospective parents in the United States faced enormous challenges
simply in arranging and paying for their lives if they wanted
to have kids. Often the livelihood of one of the spouses was
at stake, and needless to say it would usually be the mother’s.
Which meant the husband needed to earn all that much more.
Suddenly the obsession for commitment from a well-­paid man
started to make a whole lot more sense.
If you managed to calculate your way through those first
few months, you would immediately face another financial crisis
when your baby got a little bigger. If both parents went back to
work, could they afford a nanny or private day care, either one
of which was a huge expense? When the child grew even older,
American parents would then have to tally up the enormous
costs of trying to afford a house near a good public school, or
paying tuition for a private school, assuming their child could
even get in—­not to mention the costs of saving for college.
I admired the ingenuity and stamina that American c­ ouples
brought to the task of teaming up to build a family, but I was
not surprised that marriage was in retreat. Maybe this was because life in America was transforming the whole institution of
wedlock between spouses into an unappealing morass of squandered careers, insane schedules, and lost personal liberty. When
money and access to money predetermined every major decision
affecting a family and a child’s future, it was no wonder that an
American woman might pay attention to a potential husband’s
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paycheck and benefits package, no matter how modern-­minded
she was.
Simmering resentment between spouses was, of course, another key driver of the therapy industry in the United States, as
psychologists and psychiatrists profited from lucrative c­ ouples
counseling, at least among ­people who could afford it. But to me,
having come from Finland, once again the root of the problem
didn’t seem emotional or psychological. It seemed simple and
structural. American society, despite all its high-­tech innovation
and mobility, just doesn’t provide the basic support structures
for families—­support structures that all Nordic countries provide absolutely as a matter of course to everyone, as does nearly
every other modern wealthy country on the planet.
There was no doubt that for Trevor and me, our lives and
any plans we might have for a family were subject to debilitating economic uncertainty, tied to the nature of our careers and
incomes. Like not a few other Americans, I imagine, I found
myself in the evenings nursing a bowl of ice cream in front of
the British TV sensation Downton Abbey, fantasizing that I had
married a wealthy aristocrat who commanded a vast estate,
humming with helpful staff.
An estate that, better yet, would also include a well-­equipped
private medical wing, and a staff of doctors and nurses so that
we wouldn’t have to rely on the fickle whims of our employers for health care. Which brings me to the third kind of relationship that confused me in America: the relationship between
­people and their employers.
One of the most heartbreaking episodes I witnessed after
moving to the United States involved an American acquaintance who was battling cancer. To make matters even worse, it
was clear that the person’s domestic relationship was fraying at
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the same time. The peculiarly American twist on the story was
this: If the c­ ouple split up, the young cancer patient, with many
months of expensive treatment ahead, would be left without
health insurance, since it was being provided through the domestic partner’s employer. The unhappy relationship seemed to
last much longer than it should have, hurting everyone involved
far more than necessary. The trauma of the situation had been
vastly multiplied simply because of the total dependency of everyone in the equation on the employer.
Far less tragic than the story of my friend with cancer, yet
still stifling to acquaintances I’d gotten to know in a variety of
circumstances, were the cases of ­people taking a job they didn’t
really want, simply because they needed the health insurance.
Others hesitated to change jobs, or decided not to make an otherwise positive career move, because they’d have to give up their
health coverage. Less obvious than the matter of health care, but
also insidious, was the hesitancy of practically every American
I met to take their full allotment of vacation time, as allowed
by their employer, no matter how paltry. Never mind actually
leaving work every day at five.
Gradually it dawned on me how much p­ eople in America
depended on their employers for all sorts of things that were
unimaginable to me: medical care, health savings accounts, and
pension contributions, to name the most obvious. The result was
that employers ended up having far more power in the relationship than the employee. In America jeopardizing your relationship with your employer carried personal risks that extend far
beyond the workplace, to a degree unthinkable where I came
from.
Americans have a reputation for changing jobs often, but
as a result of their dependence on employer-­provided benefits,
my American acquaintances all seem far more beholden to their
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bosses than the Nordics I know. Americans hardly take any parental leave, and clearly feel obligated to work extremely long
hours, with little say over how these hours are arranged.
By contrast, I had worked a number of high-­pressure jobs
as a journalist in Finland, and while I’d often put in extra hours
or worked on weekends before a big deadline, overall I’d never
had to worry whether or not I could later take time off to make
up the difference, or take my full four or five weeks’ vacation
every year. Moreover, it wasn’t even in the realm of possibility
that all my health care could be compromised by anything to
do with my job. My Nordic friends, too, never thought twice
about taking their genuinely restorative vacation time; in fact
they were often encouraged to do so by their bosses. They enjoyed the full parental leaves they were entitled to in order to
raise a healthy baby, and they freely asked their employers for
part-­time hours for periods of time when their children were
young.
­People throughout the Nordic countries are far less concerned that such requests will reflect badly with their employers or have negative repercussions for their careers. The reason
is quite simple: In the Nordic countries the basics of health
care and other social benefits and essential ser­vices simply do
not depend on one’s employment to the degree they do in the
United States.
By now I was used to hearing the Nordic countries dismissed
as “socialist nanny states.” But ironically it was here in America
that businesses trying to manufacture products and make a buck
had somehow gotten saddled with the nanny’s job of taking care
of their employees’ health. Surely, I thought, Milton Friedman,
the great free-­market economist, must be turning in his grave!
From a Nordic perspective, it seemed ludicrous to burden for-­
profit companies with the responsibility of providing employees
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with such a fundamental, complicated, and expensive social ser­
vice.
­People in the United States were aware of this contradiction, of course, and in discussions of the American business
landscape, experts often pointed to the burdens that health-­care
obligations placed on companies, especially on small businesses.
But no one seemed to be talking about the other side of the coin:
the unhealthy dependence on employers that this creates among
employees receiving, or hoping to receive, these benefits. It was
an old-­fashioned and oppressive sort of dependence, it seemed
to me, completely at odds with the modern era of individual
liberty and opportunity. I could see the consequences in the lives
of everyone I knew.
In Europe, and especially in the Nordic countries, it had become
a bit of a cliché to criticize Americans as superficial and obsessed
with money, work, and status, rather than the more impor­
tant things in life, like family, time off, and love. After living
in America myself, however, I’d come to feel that this criticism
was unfair. The Americans I’d gotten to know were thoughtful,
loving, and kind ­people, and family was of particular importance to them. But after seeing for myself how American society forced p­ eople into situations that warped some of their most
fundamental relationships—­the relationships between parents
and children, between spouses, and between workers and employers, especially—­I could understand where the cliché was
coming from.
I also wondered if this situation might not be intimately tied
to a fourth fundamental relationship in America: the one between government and citizen. So much of the political debate
in the United States revolved, at its core, around the idea that
having too much government created a culture of dependency
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among its citizens, and that the result of this dependency was to
ruin families and businesses. But while America might indeed
have too much government and be suffocating under an unhealthy culture of dependency, it seemed to me that the size of
the government wasn’t so much the issue. Rather, it was how
government was being used, and to what end. From a Nordic
perspective, America’s problem wasn’t too much modernity. It
was too little.
At the beginning of the twenty-­first century the Nordic
countries were being admired for being the most successful and
well-­adjusted region of the globe, but what exactly had they
done? Were they really a group of small, isolated, homogeneous
populations stuck in their welfare-­sucking ways? Or was the
reality exactly the opposite?
The fast-­paced, stressful nature of modern life in a globalized world might be inevitable, but leaving ­people to muddle
through it by falling back on old-­fashioned family-­and village-­
based support structures that no longer functioned the way
they once did—­that was by no means inevitable. The more I
experienced life in the United States, the more I began to think
that what Nordic societies had figured out was how to take modernity even further—­further than America had. One might
even say that Nordic societies had succeeded in pushing past
outdated forms of social dependency, and that they had taken
modernity to its logical conclusion. The Nordic nations had
found an approach to government that deployed policies in a
smarter way to create in individual citizens not a culture of dependency, but rather, a new culture of personal self-­sufficiency
that matched modern life. The result had been to put into daily
practice the very ideals that many Americans could only fantasize about achieving in their personal lives: real freedom, real
independence, and real opportunity.
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One of the beautiful things about the Nordic approach also
turned out to be that when you pushed modernity all the way,
and freed ­people up so they had true personal independence,
they didn’t lose their connections to family, community, and one
another after all. On the contrary, the Nordic experience suggested that when you took old-­fashioned familial dependency
out of the equation, children became more empowered, spouses
more satisfied, and families more resilient—­and even happy.
With some smart policy choices, the United States could
surely achieve similar results. But first America might need its
own version of what I had started referring to as the Nordic
theory of love.
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T WO
THE NORDIC
THEORY OF LOVE
P I P P I LO N G S TO C K I N G ’ S
M AG I C
IS THE SWEDE A HUMAN BEING?
Pippi Longstocking is a rebellious girl of superhuman strength
with two perky red braids and a face full of freckles. Her mother
is dead, and her father is always away traveling, so she lives by
herself in a big house along with a monkey and a spotted white
horse that she can lift above her head. Pippi is sometimes abrupt
with ­people, and her manners aren’t the best, but her heart is in
the right place.
Pippi is the star of a Swedish children’s book series by Astrid
Lindgren, first published in the 1940s. The Pippi Longstocking books have since been translated into seventy languages and
adapted numerous times for film and television—­including
several American screen adaptations, the first hosted by Shirley Temple in 1961. In neighboring Finland, I grew up reading and loving Lindgren’s books, loving Pippi, and especially
loving her horse, which she brought indoors and rode bareback.
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But Pippi is also a legend among children and families all over
the world, not just in the Nordic countries—­my American
husband, Trevor, remembers having the Pippi Longstocking
books read to him as a kid, too. But what is it, exactly, that captivates so many p­ eople about Pippi?
Pippi’s best friends in the stories are the two children next
door, Annika and Tommy. Unlike Pippi, they belong to an
intact and idyllic nuclear family. The significance of Pippi’s
character and her relationship with Annika and Tommy was
never explicitly clear to me as a child, or even as an adult, until a
man named Lars Trägårdh pointed it out to me.
Lars Trägårdh is a Swedish scholar and historian who lived
in the United States for decades and knows the country intimately. As a boy Trägårdh had dreamed of coming to America,
and after high school in Sweden he was accepted by Pomona, a
small liberal arts college in California. As he set out to do what
millions of Americans do every year—­apply for financial aid to
help cover the cost of his college tuition—­he got his first taste
of how things worked in the United States. The financial aid
office at Pomona gave him two sets of forms to fill out. One
asked about his income and savings. The other asked about his
parents’ income and savings.
Trägårdh was confused. He was already eighteen, legally an
adult. In Sweden his parents no longer had any responsibility for
him or any legal right to be involved in his affairs. He supported
himself, and he didn’t understand what his parents’ money had
to do with his college expenses. Trägårdh remembers that when
he explained all this to a financial aid officer at Pomona, he was
told that in America, parents love their children so much that
they happily spend tens of thousands of dollars—­today it could
easily be hundreds of thousands—­on college.
The exchange led Trägårdh to a lifetime of thinking and
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writing about the American dream, and how it compares to
the Nordic dream. The son of a single mother, he did receive
the financial aid he needed, and once he finished his studies at
Pomona in the 1970s, he ran a café in San Francisco, became an
entrepreneur and started his own computer business, and then
eventually returned to academia and earned his PhD from UC
Berkeley in the early 1990s. He taught European history for a
decade at Barnard College in New York City until he moved
back to Sweden with his American wife. His current work
at a Swedish university focuses on children’s rights and social
trust—­the moral glue that helps hold societies together.
Some years ago Trägårdh and a coauthor came out with a
book called Är svensken människa? (Is the Swede a human being?)
This somewhat startling question refers to the title of a past work
that many Swedes would probably recognize, but that requires a
little explanation for the rest of us, and that, in a roundabout way,
gets us back to the subject of Pippi Longstocking.
In the 1940s, around the same time that Astrid Lindgren
was writing the first of her stories about the vivacious and likable Pippi, another Swedish writer was analyzing the Swedish character and writing a very different sort of book, with
that provocative question as his title. His name was Sanfrid
Neander-­Nilsson, and as far as he was concerned, the Swedish
national character was ice cold, inward-­turned, sad, depressed,
and almost animal-­like. It was a portrait of Swedes who yearned
for solitude and feared other p­ eople—­nothing like Pippi Longstocking.
A characterization of Swedes as the ultimate loners may
seem surprising, especially considering Pippi Longstocking’s
global popularity. But there is some truth to it—­we Nordics
aren’t known to be especially outgoing, and we probably deserve our reputation as stoic, silent types who can be a bit dour.
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That said, the stereotypical Nordic person would probably
also be thought of as someone who, although perhaps not particularly talkative, is sensitive to the needs of his or her fellow
human beings, especially since we’re sometimes believed to have
socialist tendencies. It follows that we ought to have a collective
mind-­set and some solidarity, not be extreme individualists.
In fact, however, a powerful strain of individualism is part of
the bedrock of Nordic societies—­so much so that Lars Trägårdh
felt it was worth dusting off the old question “Is the Swede a
human being?” and taking a fresh and more positive look at
Nordic individualism. After years of observing the differences
between Sweden and the United States, Trägårdh identifies in
his book some fundamental qualities at the heart of Swedish
society—­qualities that also exist in all Nordic societies—­that help
explain Nordic success. Indeed, Trägårdh’s findings tell us a lot
about why the Nordic countries are doing so well in surveys of
global competitiveness and quality of life. And for me Trägårdh
helped explain why I’d been feeling so confused by American
relationships, especially those between parents and children,
between spouses, and between employees and their employers.
It all came down to the Nordic way of thinking about love—­
perfectly exemplified by Pippi Longstocking.
Trägårdh and his collaborator—­
a well-­
known Swedish
historian and journalist named Henrik Berggren—­put together
their observations on individualism and formulated something
they called “the Swedish theory of love.” The core idea is that
authentic love and friendship are possible only between individuals who are independent and equal. This notion represents
exactly the values that I grew up with and that I feel are most
dear to Finns as well as p­ eople from the other Nordic nations,
not just Swedes, so I like to call it “the Nordic theory of love.”
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For the citizens of the Nordic countries, the most important
values in life are individual self-­sufficiency and independence
in relation to other members of the community. If you’re a fan
of American individualism and personal freedom, this might
strike you as downright all-­American thinking.
A person who must depend on his or her fellow citizens
is, like it or not, put in a position of being subservient and
unequal. Even worse, as Trägårdh and Berggren explain in
their discussion of the moral logic of the Pippi Longstocking
stories, “He who is in debt, who is beholden to others, or who
requires the charity and kindness not only from strangers but
also from his most intimate companions to get by, also becomes
untrustworthy. . . . He becomes dishonest and inauthentic.”
In the realm of Pippi—­who, let’s remember, is a strong
superhuman girl living alone in a big house—­this means that
exactly because she is totally self-­sufficient, her friendship with
the children next door, Tommy and Annika, is a great gift to
them. That’s because they are absolutely assured that Pippi’s
friendship is being given freely, no strings attached. It’s precisely because Pippi is an exaggeration of self-­sufficiency that
she draws our awareness to the purity and unbridled enthusiasm of her love, and elicits our admiring affection. In real
life, of course, a child Pippi’s age would still have a healthy dependency on her parents, the way her neighbors Tommy and
Annika do. But Pippi illustrates an ideal of unencumbered
love, whose logic, in Nordic thinking, extends to most real-­life
adult relationships.
What Lars Trägårdh came to understand during his years in
the United States was that the overarching ambition of Nordic
societies during the course of the twentieth century, and into
the twenty-­first, has not been to socialize the economy at all, as
is often mistakenly assumed. Rather the goal has been to free
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the individual from all forms of dependency within the family
and in civil society: the poor from charity, wives from husbands,
adult children from parents, and elderly parents from their
children. The express purpose of this freedom is to allow all
those human relationships to be unencumbered by ulterior
motives and needs, and thus to be entirely free, completely
authentic, and driven purely by love.
I wanted to talk with Trägårdh myself about all this, so I
contacted him in Sweden from my new home in New York.
As we chatted on Skype, he explained that these were precisely
the reasons why he’d felt so at odds with his American college’s
financial aid policy. “In the United States there is both a moral,
and to some extent legal, expectation that parents provide
for their children even after the children have come of age,”
Trägårdh said. “But this expectation also means that parents
have power over their children.”
Freed from such expectations, p­ eople in Nordic societies
can raise their children primarily with the goal of helping them
become independent and capable of handling life on their own.
The prevailing expectation is that every person should be able
to craft his or her own life, without an excessive financial debt
to one’s parents, for example, that might skew one’s decisions.
There is a corresponding expectation that no one should be penalized in advance by the unlucky accident of having parents
who might, for whatever reason, have less than robust finances.
Similarly a wife should not be put in a position of being financially overdependent on her husband. Or vice versa, for that
matter. And p­ eople should be able to make choices related to
their employment without worrying whether they will still be
able to receive, say, treatment for cancer.
All this creates relationships that are much freer of resentments, guilt, and baggage. In this sense, then, the Nordic theory
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of love is an intimate philosophy for how empowered individuals can engage in personal relationships in the modern age.
Liberated from many of the more onerous financial and logistical obligations of the old days, we can base our relationships
with family, friends, and loved ones more on pure human connection. We are also freer to express our true feelings in our
relationships with others.
At the same time the Nordic theory of love has become an
overarching philosophy about how to structure a society. As
such, it has inspired the broad variety of policy choices in the
Nordic nations that together ensure a single, predominant goal:
independence, freedom, and opportunity for every member of
society. Most of the major decisions the Nordic nations have
made, whether related to family policies, education, or health
care, have followed from, and are direct manifestations of, the
Nordic theory of love. While the inspiration for these decisions
may originally have been rooted in Nordic cultural values, the
policy choices themselves are not questions of culture—­they are
exactly that: policy choices. How all this has worked, however,
is widely misunderstood in America.
THE MARCH OF MODERNITY
In the United States the biggest perceived enemy to individual
freedom is the state, and Americans do have a point. History has
proved beyond a doubt that the state can be used to oppress and
even completely destroy individual liberties. After all, for decades America’s worst enemy was the Soviet Union, where the
state often controlled even the most intimate details of p­ eople’s
lives. When American critics of Nordic success condemn countries like my own as “socialist nanny states,” they are voicing
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a real fear that citizens could become docile lambs, subject to
increasing government influence and control.
Every time I hear an American refer to Finland as a socialist country, however, I feel like I’ve been suddenly transported
back to the 1950s. Finns of my generation and older have a
pretty good idea of what socialism is, not to mention communism, having grown up with the Soviet Union right on our
doorstep. Our nation fought three brutal wars against socialism
in the twentieth century to protect our freedom, independence,
and free-­market system.
A little history: Until the early twentieth century, Finland
was ruled alternately by Sweden and Russia, but gained its independence in 1917 when the Communist revolution in Russia
overthrew the czars, creating the soon-­to-­be Soviet juggernaut.
Finland was immediately plunged into a bitter struggle that
pitted Finland’s own working class—­sympathetic to the Russian Communist cause—­against our own conservative capitalists. In a short but vicious civil war, the free-­market forces in
Finland won, crushing the socialist uprising.
Then, when the Soviet Union threatened Finland’s independence two decades later, Finns beat back socialism both times,
preserving Finnish freedom and independence—­at great sacrifice. Nearly a fifth of Finland’s entire population fought against
the Soviets, and many more participated as nurses and in other
supporting roles. Some 93,000 Finns perished out of a population of 3.7 million.
Here’s how we in Finland understand socialism: The government controls production and bans ownership of ­property—­no
private factories, companies, or stores, and no free markets. No
one is allowed to accumulate any personal riches. There is only
one political party, few personal freedoms, and little or no free-
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dom of speech. Socialism is one step away from communism,
which Karl Marx defined as a situation in which the government, or indeed, the state itself, has become expendable.
The idea that a contemporary Nordic society is anything
like this sort of socialism is absurd. The notion that even a liberal American leader such as Barack Obama could be considered a socialist, as some of his conservative critics like to claim,
seems to us downright comic. In fact such stereotypes quickly
wear thin for us Finns. The number of Finns who sacrificed
their lives fighting socialism and communism in the twentieth
century is roughly the same as the number of Americans who
died in America’s two hot wars against communism—­Korea
and Vietnam—­and that’s out of a population about one-­sixtieth
the size of America’s. Over the past seventy years what the experience of the Nordic nations actually suggests is that even the
United States, with its already very impressive commitments to
freedom, might actually be able to learn a few things from us
about freedom and free-­market capitalism.
Indeed, what if the entire purpose of the state in the twenty-­
first century, as agreed upon and expressly stated by its citizens,
was not to take more power away from the p­ eople, but just the
opposite: to push the modern values of freedom and independence even further, to provide the ­people with the logistical
foundation for the most comprehensive form of individual liberty possible? It is exactly this exceptional commitment to individualism that defines the Nordic social contract today. And the
results of this approach are plain to see from the Nordic region’s
rankings in global surveys, not only in quality of life but in
economic dynamism as well.
All the advantages I gave up when I left Finland and moved
to America—­universal public health care, universal affordable
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day care, real maternity benefits, high-­quality free education,
taxpayer-­funded residences for the elderly, even the separate
taxation of spouses—­were not gifts from the government to
make me a servile dependent on the state’s largesse. Rather the
Nordic system is intentionally designed to take into account
the specific challenges of modern life and give citizens as much
logistical and financial independence as possible. This is actually the opposite of a community-­centered system, or socialism,
or whatever you want to call it. This is also why the supposed
social solidarity of ­people in the Nordic nations is not really as
noble an undertaking as it is often made out to be.
Here’s how Trägårdh puts it: “The Swedes like to flatter
themselves into thinking that they are just very altruistic p­ eople,
always doing good things,” he told me. The same could be said
of Finns, or other Nordics. However, what really motivates
Swedes and other Nordic citizens to support their system isn’t
altruism—­no one is that selfless—­but self-­interest. Nordic societies provide their citizens—­all their citizens, and especially the
middle class—­with maximum autonomy from old-­fashioned,
traditional ties of dependency, which among other things ends
up saving ­people a lot of money and heartache along with securing personal freedom. According to Trägårdh and Berggren,
Nordic countries are, in fact, the most individualized societies
on the face of the earth.
I know just how horrible this might sound to some Americans. Surely it brings to mind a totalitarian state—­one that has
cleverly severed all emotional ties between ­people in order to
make citizens into slaves of the system. You could also be forgiven for harboring a dim view of Nordic society simply from
living in Finland. Finns themselves love nothing more than
to grumble and complain constantly about how everything in
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their country is terrible—­how the social ser­vices are terrible,
how burdensome family relations are, how children are growing up miserable, how the government is a terrible bureaucratic overlord. Part of this is simply human nature: ­People
always find fault with their situation no matter how good they
have it. But the reality is that many Finns really have no idea
how good they do have it, because they’ve never been on their
own as a citizen of a place like the United States. Even many
of my cosmopolitan and well-­educated Finnish acquaintances
still don’t understand, for example, even after I’ve explained
it to them for the hundredth time, that despite the passage of
ObamaCare (the Affordable Care Act), the United States still
does not have a universal public health-­care system. It’s simply
unimaginable to them that an advanced rich country could be
so backward.
Despite the genuine grumbling you hear in Nordic societies, if you compare statistics on family life in Nordic countries
during recent decades with those in other countries, it becomes
clear that loving families, well-­adjusted children, and caring
communities are by far the Nordic norm. When UNICEF
looked at children’s well-­being throughout the different rich
nations of the world—­considering such metrics as childhood
poverty, children’s health and safety, family relationships,
­education, and behavior, including diet, teenage pregnancy,
and bullying—­the Netherlands, Norway, Iceland, Finland, and
Sweden ranked best. Sad to say, the United States came in near
the bottom. A study by Save the Children deemed Nordic nations the world’s best countries for mothers, while the United
States came in thirty-­third. How is that possible? It’s possible
because freeing p­ eople from the shackles of financial and other
sorts of dependency on one another enables them to be more
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caring toward each other, not less. This is precisely the Nordic
theory of love in action.
But surely all this Nordic talk of extreme individualism
and independence means that even if Nordic p­ eople love their
families, the bonds of family ultimately are weak. Indeed, by
dispensing with many of the financial interdependencies that
require a husband and wife to stay together, doesn’t the Nordic
arrangement encourage families to break apart?
Actually, by empowering individuals for the modern age,
the Nordic theory of love has given the family a reboot, making
it, in a sense, more up-­to-­date and relevant—­and better prepared for the challenges of the twenty-­first century. In a report
prepared for the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, titled The Nordic Way, Trägårdh and Berggren write:
“The family remains a central social institution in the Nordic
countries, but it too is infused with the same moral logic stressing autonomy and equality. The ideal family is made up of
adults who work and are not financially dependent on the
other, and children who are encouraged to be as independent
as early as possible. Rather than undermining ‘family values’
this could be interpreted as a modernization of the family as a
social institution.”
An example that Trägårdh uses to illustrate the Nordic
theory of love, and to show how Nordic societies value family, is
elder care. In the United States, if your parents develop a long-­
term health condition in their old age, taking care of them and
paying their medical bills can steal away years of your life. In the
Nordic countries, if one or both of your parents are chronically
ill, you can rely on your country’s universal health-­care system
to handle the logistics and medical treatment. The result? You
are freed up to do the more rewarding, loving things in the
precious time you have left with your ailing parent, which the
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social workers can’t do: go for a walk, talk, read, just spend time
together.
“When surveys ask elderly Swedes whether they prefer to be
dependent on their own adult children or the state,” Trägårdh
told me, “they say the state. If you rephrase the question and
ask if they’d like their children to visit them, they all say yes. So
it is not that the elderly in Sweden don’t want to have relationships with their children. It’s that they don’t want to see them on
terms and conditions where they are being reduced to a state of
dependency in relation to their own children.”
Despite the doubts that some Americans still seem to have about
the Nordic countries’ commitment to free markets, Sweden,
Finland, the United States, and other wealthy industrialized
nations are all societies immersed in modern capitalism. It is
precisely life in this modern free-­market world that is breaking
down the old-­fashioned, traditional relationships of family and
community, gradually equalizing gender roles, and encouraging
individuality and independence. Critics sometimes argue that
the Nordic countries have little to teach the rest of the world,
because their success is specific to an isolated group of small,
culturally uniform, ethnically homogeneous countries. But this
misses the larger point. While the Nordic theory of love may
have emerged as a set of cultural ideas specific to the region, the
smart social policies that have resulted happen to dovetail perfectly with the universal challenges that all nations are facing as
modernity inevitably advances.
Today the United States is at once a hypermodern society
in its embrace of the contemporary free-­market system, but
an antiquarian society in leaving it to families and other community institutions to address the problems the system creates.
Seen from a Nordic perspective, the United States is stuck in a
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c­ onflict, but it’s not the conflict between liberals and conservatives, or between Democrats and Republicans, and it’s not the
old debate about bigger government versus smaller government. It’s the conflict between the past and the future. Much
of America’s government does look ridiculously bloated and
intrusive in all the wrong ways for modernity. The way the
United States government micromanages society with case-­by-­
case policies, and hands out uniquely tailored gifts left and right
to special interests, strikes a Nordic as a clearly outdated way to
govern. And whether the United States wants to admit this to
itself or not, staying stuck in the past is putting itself at an ever-­
increasing disadvantage in the world.
As the world continues to evolve and change, all nations
need new ideas. One of America’s best-­known commentators,
the columnist David Brooks, expressed this need particularly
well in relation to the United States in an article he titled “The
Talent Society.” “We’re living in the middle of an amazing era
of individualism,” Brooks wrote, expressing a view that’s actually almost identical to Trägårdh’s. The evidence that Brooks
cites makes it clear that the changes caused by the relentless advance of modernity are happening whether we like it or not.
Whereas a few generations ago it was considered shameful for
­people to have children unless they were married, for example,
now more than 50 percent of births to American women under
thirty occur outside of marriage. More than 50 percent of American adults are single, and 28 percent of households consist of
just one person. There are more single-­person American households than there are married-­with-­children households. More
Americans consider themselves politically independent than
either Republican or Democrat. Lifetime employment is down,
and union membership has plummeted.
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“The trend is pretty clear,” Brooks concluded, articulating
his own version of how old-­fashioned, traditional relationships
have given way to personal independence: “Fifty years ago,
America was groupy. P
­ eople were more likely to be enmeshed in
stable, dense and obligatory relationships. They were more defined by permanent social roles: mother, father, deacon. Today,
individuals have more freedom. They move between more diverse, loosely structured and flexible networks of relationships.”
Brooks paints a picture of an America that allows “the ambitious and the gifted to surf through amazing possibilities,”
but where the ­people who lack these skills fall further behind.
Though this captures America’s dilemma to a degree, it’s not
the complete picture. When it comes to “the ambitious and the
gifted,” we need to add that for the most part, it’s only the ambitious and gifted lucky enough to have access to substantial private resources who find opportunity in America today.
Brooks says it is time to build new versions of the settled,
stable, and thick arrangements of the past that Americans have
left behind. This is exactly what the Nordic region has set out
to do, and the Nordic theory of love has turned out to be a solid
foundation for what Brooks calls the “diverse, loosely structured, and flexible networks of relationships” that characterize
our current cultural and economic life. In an age when p­ eople
are experiencing more freedom than ever, Finland and its
Nordic neighbors have found a way to expand personal liberty
while also ensuring that the vast majority of individuals—­not
just the elite—­have new ways to be stable and be able to prosper.
As the twenty-­first century progresses, countries that can
figure out their own version of the Nordic theory of love will
have a long-­
term advantage. Good quality of life, worker
satisfaction and health, economic dynamism, and political
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freedom and stability are all interconnected. Given all that, if
the United States were able to borrow anything from the successes of Nordic societies to reinvigorate its own success—­just
supposing—­where would it begin?
Well, from a Nordic point of view, a pretty good place to
start would be at the beginning, with babies.
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THREE
FAMILY VALUES
FOR REAL
STRONG INDIVIDUALS FORM
A BEAUTIFUL TEAM
I T S TA R T S W I T H C H I L D R E N
When my American acquaintance Jennifer realized she was
pregnant, she asked her friends for recommendations for
good obstetricians. She called the doctors to see whether they
accepted her insurance, and which hospital they were affiliated with. When Jennifer found a doctor she liked and could
see without additional costs, she started going for regular appointments. Most of the visits focused on medical care, and she
remembers getting general advice about becoming a new mother
only in regard to the possibility of post-­partum depression. On
matters such as breast-­feeding, she consulted the Internet and
her friends.
At the time she was working for a large media company in
New York City. Her workdays would often stretch until seven
or eight at night. Now that she was pregnant, she asked her
boss if she could transfer to a position with shorter days and
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more predictable hours. Although he wasn’t required to accommodate her request, her boss was generous and agreed. A few
months before her due date Jennifer suffered early labor pains,
and her doctor assigned her to bed rest. Again her employer was
generous, allowing her to work from home until the baby was
born, for which she was grateful.
After giving birth she stayed in a semiprivate room in the
hospital for three days with her insurance covering the costs
while she recovered from her cesarean. Then she started her
three months of unpaid maternity leave. The short-­
term
disability insurance offered by her employer paid her salary for
ten weeks, and when she returned to work, her husband used
accrued vacation time to stay home with the baby for another
month.
Jennifer had started looking for day care early, since she
knew it would be an ordeal. She researched a variety of day-­
care centers to determine their quality and reputation, checked
waiting lists, compared prices, and asked for recommendations.
Eventually she settled on one that would cost her and her husband $1,200 a month for one child, or $14,400 a year, a typical
price in the New York City area. Her baby started there at the
age of four months.
By the time Jennifer got pregnant again, she was working
for a much smaller company. The hours were more manageable, but her health insurance had changed, and she couldn’t
see the doctor from her first pregnancy anymore. Since the new
company employed less than fifty ­people, she was no longer
entitled to any leave, nor did the new company offer short-­
term disability insurance. So even though she suffered severe
back pain throughout her second and third trimesters, she had
no choice but to go to the office every day, where she spent six
months in agony. After she gave birth via C-­section, her doctors
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encouraged her to get up and start moving. She went home after
a few days. Soon after returning she was on the couch, holding
the baby, when she felt the sickening sensation of something
leaking all over her. The surgical wound had opened, and she
had to visit her doctor’s office to have it stitched closed again.
Her new employer was more generous than it needed to be, and
offered her six weeks of paid maternity leave. Since her husband had not accrued enough new vacation days to take time
off, after that her son joined his sister in day care—­at the age of
six weeks. “I had a C-­section, and that’s a major abdominal surgery,” Jennifer said later. “So you’re going back to work after six
weeks, not having slept the whole time, after a major surgery,
and with an infant. If you ask me, it’s barbaric.”
In the system she was in, Jennifer could actually count herself lucky. Her first employer allowed her to work from home,
and for both pregnancies, her health insurance covered all the
costs. This is not always the case. On average, women with
insurance pay several thousands of dollars out of pocket for
giving birth in the United States. Women without insurance
face costs that can quickly climb into the tens of thousands of
dollars.
As for time off, Americans who have worked for a company with more than fifty employees for more than a year have
the right to a total of twelve weeks of family or medical leave
annually—­unpaid, of course—­but that leave can be used up by
any of the following events: the birth of a child; an adoption;
caring for an ailing child, spouse, or parent; or an illness. In
2012 this law covered only slightly more than half of American
workers. For everyone else there is no universal guarantee of
any leave for any reason—­not for having children, not for getting sick. The small businesses that Americans applaud as the
backbone of the U.S. economy have a darker side: the utter lack
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of any security for their employees. Technically companies are
not allowed to fire someone for getting pregnant. The truth,
however, is that it happens all the time.
When it comes to family and medical leave for workers,
the United States is utterly out of line with the contemporary
norms of modern nations. While Nordic citizens often don’t realize how good they have it, Americans seem not to realize how
terribly they are being treated. According to a UN report from
2014 surveying 185 countries and territories, only two did not
guarantee any paid maternity leave; Papua New Guinea and the
United States. The United States is also one of only a handful of
countries that don’t guarantee their workers any paid time off
for illness—­others include Angola, India, and Liberia.
As a result, when Americans have children, their options
vary widely depending on where they live, for whom they
work, and how high up the job-­skills and corporate ladders
they’ve managed to climb. Some states and cities require companies to give their employees some paid time off for illness.
California is one of the few states that offer paid family leave for
workers who have contributed to the state’s disability insurance
program—­but only for six weeks, and only at about half their
normal pay. Advocates for family leave in the United States celebrate California’s example as progressive, and it is certainly a
start. But by the standards of any Nordic country, a paltry six
weeks at half pay is still way behind the times.
It’s true that some of the better American companies offer
their employees paid sick days as a benefit, and some even offer
paid family leave. Google’s five months of paid maternity leave
have often been hailed as outstanding. Some companies also subsidize short-­term disability insurance for their workers, which
then might cover part of an employee’s salary during unpaid
parental leave, as it did during Jennifer’s first pregnancy. Many
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new moms use a combination of sick days and vacation time to
create some paid parental leave, but that robs them of a much-­
needed chance to rest later in the year.
Overall the reality in the United States is grim: In 2015 only
one in ten Americans working for private companies had access
to paid family leave—­although 87 percent did get at least some
unpaid leave. Fully a third of private-­sector workers had no access
to any paid sick days. A quarter had no paid vacation. Even for
those who did have paid vacation, the average length of the allotted vacation for a full-­time worker in private industry was, after
one year of employment, just ten days. That increased, after four
more years, to an infinitesimally more generous total of fifteen
days. Between 2006 and 2010, nearly a third of American working mothers reported taking no maternity leave whatsoever. For
those who did, the average length of the leave was ten weeks.
Jennifer wrapped all this up for me succinctly: “In this country you are at the mercy of your employer. You really don’t have
any rights. Because of that you live in a constant state of worry.”
In countries informed by the Nordic theory of love, the American response to the birth of a baby makes no sense. As wealthy,
modern, industrialized nations, the Nordic countries have
realized that the productivity of their workers and businesses,
as well as the long-­term health of their societies and economies,
depends first and foremost on healthy relationships between
children and their parents, between spouses, and between parents and their employers. Thus the Nordic response to the birth
of a baby is rather different.
In Finland, when a woman I got to know named Hanna
realized she was pregnant, she phoned the local maternity clinic
operated by her town close to Helsinki and made an appointment to see a nurse. When she arrived for that first appointment,
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she and her baby were immediately gathered into the embrace
of the comprehensive system of care that Finland has set up to
nurture all families—­which is to say every Finnish family in the
entire country, regardless of income, municipality, or employment.
Throughout the pregnancy the nurse, and less frequently
the doctor, monitored Hanna’s health while they counseled
her on breast-­feeding, foods to avoid, and feelings that might
arise during such a significant life event. The nurse ran tests on
Hanna to check for any early signs of trouble, and discussed her
health history with her, the risks of alcohol and drug use, and
the dangers of smoking. Whenever Hanna had a question, she
could go see the nurse for advice, or simply call a help line set up
for expecting and new parents.
Hanna’s pregnancy proceeded smoothly, and she ended up
only needing to see the doctor a few times. The nurse signed
her up for the usual two ultrasounds, and neither revealed any
problems. Hanna decided to pay for two additional sonograms
at a private doctor, just for her own satisfaction and peace of
mind. If any problems had arisen, however, the public health-­
care system would have sprung into action. When my Finnish
sister-­in-­law Veera’s belly appeared unusually small during her
first pregnancy, she was immediately sent to the hospital for additional checkups. In her case, happily, everything turned out
to be fine. The same applied to another friend who experienced
mild heart arrhythmia during her pregnancy.
For Hanna and her husband, Olli, the total cost of all this attentive prenatal care—­apart from the two private sonograms—­
was, well, zero. Hearing this, an American might have one of
two reactions. Hanna and Olli must be paying exorbitantly high
taxes to subsidize all this public welfare, leaving them pathetically poor compared with an equivalent American family, who
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could at least choose what kind of health insurance they wanted
to pay for. Or the American listener might feel sorry for Hanna
and Olli, concluding that they must be very poor to begin with,
or an at-­risk family, to have qualified for so much free monitoring, counseling, and help.
Setting aside for the moment the question of taxes—­a very
interesting question indeed, which I’ll return to later—­Hanna
and Olli are neither poor nor at-­risk. They met when they were
both students in one of Finland’s most prestigious university
programs in industrial engineering and management, at what is
today Aalto University. By the time Hanna got pregnant, both
she and Olli were working in high-­powered jobs at successful management-­consulting firms in Helsinki. The care they
received during Hanna’s pregnancy was pretty much the standard care anyone in Finland would receive. Some of my friends
in Finland find all the questions from the nurses about their
private lives slightly intrusive, but mostly they take it all in
stride, because they know that the clinics are working to ensure
the well-­being of their child. Many are very happy to receive so
much help, especially since the free visits continue after the baby
is born, when new parents are most likely to have questions and
feel overwhelmed.
As Hanna’s due date approached, she and Olli were offered
a choice of hospitals nearby. They got to tour the facilities in
advance, where they learned about the birthing stools, bathtubs,
and pain relief methods the mother could use while in labor.
Then, when Hanna finally went into labor, both she and Olli
stayed in a private room in the public hospital for four days,
with their newborn in a crib next to them. The specially trained
nurse-­midwives running the maternity ward checked on the
family several times a day, while Olli took charge of changing
diapers and picking up meals and medications.
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This, too, is all standard care for all Finnish parents. My
sister-­in-­law, Veera, still reminisces warmly about all the helpful advice she got from the public hospital staff after the birth
of her first child, including lessons on how to bathe the baby,
change diapers, and breast-­feed. The hospital’s nurse-­midwives
were a godsend, Veera told me, and the private room she and
my brother Mikko stayed in for three days was a blessing for
a young family trying to get its bearings. “And it wasn’t just
some oatmeal for us,” Veera said happily a few years later, as we
looked at photos of the births of their two children. “All the best
yogurt, muesli, dried fruit—­the works.”
Hanna and Olli needed less guidance in caring for their
new baby because they already had one small child at home—­a
baby they’d recently adopted. However, since the birth had
left Hanna with some physical trauma, she was provided with
a physical therapist right away, so she could begin her healing
process while still at the hospital. Hanna related all this to me a
­couple of months after the experience, as we sat in the kitchen
of her home on the outskirts of Helsinki. “I really think it all
worked extremely well,” she said, as her new baby, Oliver, slept
in his crib beside us. “I had a fairly difficult birth, but I have
gotten all the care I’ve needed, and nobody rushed us to leave
the hospital before I was ready.”
For all this, however, Hanna and Olli did have to pay. I’m
sorry to say that the bill came to a staggering $375.
Not everyone’s experiences of giving birth in Finland are
always rosy. If there is a rush, mothers might have to share
rooms or give birth in a hospital that wasn’t their first choice.
Municipalities do have different routines and facilities. Giving
birth can be a harrowing experience under any conditions. Yet
most of my Finnish friends tell me glowing stories of the care
they received during their pregnancy and delivery. One ­couple
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I know stayed in a private room in the hospital for a week because the mother was having trouble getting started with her
breast-­feeding. Until the medical staff was sure the baby was
properly receiving nourishment, the hospital never once suggested that they should pack up and leave. This extended
private stay, admittedly, did bring their hospital bill up a bit—­to
about five hundred dollars.
This is what the Nordic theory of love looks like in Finland
when a baby is born. As much as possible, the theory is that parents should be able to focus on welcoming new life into the world
and loving their newborn, rather than being overwhelmed by
the logistical challenges involved. The other Nordic countries
all have similar practices, too, though with some local variations.
The Danish attitude toward childbirth tends to be a bit less
doting than the Finnish, with more emphasis on natural birth,
without epidurals or long hospital stays; that said, treatments
like acupuncture to ease labor pains are routine. My Danish
friend Brandur was promptly sent home in the wee hours of the
morning after the birth of his and his wife Hannah’s first baby,
while Hannah and the baby stayed behind. “The hospital is not
a hotel,” a nurse informed him brusquely, sending the giddy
man off to find a cab and, as Brandur remembers, “talk way too
much to the taxi driver.” When another Danish acquaintance,
Sigrid, had her first child by cesarean, she was grateful that the
nurses let her stay in the hospital for a week to help ensure she
was breast-­feeding without trouble; by contrast, after her next
two vaginal deliveries they let her go home a few hours after
giving birth. She and her husband thought this was perfectly
fine, as did the other Danes I know who had had similar experiences. A Swedish friend of mine, meanwhile, gushed about how
much time the nurses always had for her during her pregnancy,
while two other Swedes felt that the same ser­vice was even a
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bit too much, with all that sitting and chatting about feelings.
Some Swedes I know got private rooms for their deliveries,
some didn’t. On average, all they had to pay was the grand fee
of about fifty dollars for their hospital stays.
Once a new baby has been brought safely into the world, the
Nordic theory of love has some things to say about its first year
of life. Nordic nations have realized that it is in the best long-­
term interests of everyone, including businesses, to support families in raising children. After all, in the long run, happy family
members are more productive, and businesses will have a wider
pool of healthy, productive, well-­adjusted workers to draw on
in the future. So when it comes to granting parental leave after
a baby is born, the Nordic approach is also quite different from
the American.
Throughout the entire Nordic region, the universal minimum amount of parental leave that new parents receive,
regardless of where they work, is nine months. While on leave
the parent who stays home also receives at least 70 percent of
his or her pay for the entire duration of the leave. Some countries do put a cap on these payments, but only for ­people who
have particularly high salaries. Some Nordic countries offer a
variety of options, too; in Norway families can choose eleven
months at full pay or thirteen months at 80 percent. But the basic
duration and pay of parental leaves are universally guaranteed.
Parental leave policy is not dependent on the whims of different employers of different sizes, or on the vagaries of different
local arrangements. Nordic parental leaves are a function of a
simple, straightforward, uniform national policy, and pay is furnished through taxes managed by each country’s social security
system. To make things fair, Nordic parental leaves are funded
by all employees and employers, not just the firms that happen
to have hired pregnant women or women with small children.
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That said, Nordic parental leaves are also flexible. Parents can
tailor the allotted time off to their individual needs, portioning
it between the mother and the father, and adjusting the timing.
Moreover, all Nordic countries have earmarked some leave
specifically for fathers, to encourage their active participation
in child rearing, and to lessen the stigma that men might experience in the workplace when they become active, involved
parents.
In Finland the first four months of parental leave go specifically to the mother, and the leave begins at least five weeks before
her due date. After she gives birth she then has three months to
recover and breast-­feed the baby, which most Finnish mothers
choose to do. Nevertheless all new fathers can also take three
paid weeks off at the same time to help around the house and
bond with the baby. As for the subsequent six months, parents
can divide that allotment between them as they like. Finally,
the father has another six weeks of paternity leave to use on his
own, which is not available to the mother. Again, this is not dependent on the particular policies at the workplace, but rather is
a universal right of any new parent, man or woman.
The system functions smoothly and is widely accepted as the
norm, by employers as well as families. What’s more, after the
ten months of parental leave are used up in Finland, one parent
can still stay home, without losing his or her job, until the child
turns three. The parent doesn’t continue to receive a portion
of his or her salary during this period, but does receive a small
home-­care allowance. At the end of the parent’s period of home
leave, up to three years, he or she is welcomed back and reintegrated into the original workplace.
When Hanna and Olli had adopted their first child, a baby
from Kenya, the Kenyan adoption agency required the new
parents to stay in Kenya for more than a half year as part of the
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process. Hanna took a year of paid maternity leave, while Olli
also took a leave of seven months, though for both parents to
take such long leaves at the same time was unusual, and Olli’s
had to be unpaid. Then, with the birth of their second child,
Hanna began her maternity leave a month before her due date
and planned to stay home for a year and a half. After the baby
was born Olli took off two weeks, and was eligible for more
leave later.
When both parents return to work, the Nordic theory of love
comes into play in a new way. At this stage of a young child’s
life, Nordic societies want to ensure that both parents are able to
focus again on being fully engaged and productive employees,
while at the same time also remaining good parents. In America
day care is often one of the most vexing logistical challenges
that parents face, and one of their most exorbitant expenses.
By contrast, Nordic societies have decided to free parents from
this burden as it is good for all the individuals and institutions
involved: employers, parents, and—­not least, of course—­the
children themselves. Thanks to the Nordic theory of love, every
parent in Finland, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark has easy
access to inexpensive, convenient day care, publicly subsidized
and generally paid for on a sliding scale according to a family’s
income. Access to day care begins as soon as parents complete
their initial parental leaves, and day-­care centers are regulated
to ensure high quality. Privately run day care is certainly also
available in many places, if parents prefer that option.
In Finland, because parents are guaranteed the right to
return to their jobs for up to three years after the birth of a
child, most families opt to have one or the other parent care for
their children themselves at home for the first two years, after
which the vast majority chooses one of the excellent public day-­
care centers. Low-­income families get the ser­vice for free, and
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high-­income families pay up to a cap, which for 2016 was about
$350 per month or $4,200 per year for a first child, with the
­incremental costs reduced for each additional child.
Hanna and Olli wanted to give their adopted child the
chance to attend an English-­language day care because of his
international background, so Hanna went online to check out
the list of local day-­care centers, picked two private facilities
close to their home, and sent each an e-­mail. One accepted
their son immediately, and the matter was settled. Because even
private day-­care centers are subsidized, Hanna and Olli paid
only a little more than the monthly fee they would have for
public day care: about $370.
I asked Hanna if she was worried that taking such long
parental leaves might hurt her career, and whether Olli had also
worried about the same thing, since he’d taken seven months
off himself—­after all, management consulting is an infamously
cutthroat business. What’s more, Hanna’s company operated all
over the world and its roots were in the United States—­Hanna
had even spent a year in the company’s American offices.
“I think Olli wondered about that,” Hanna told me, “and
I did somewhat, too.” But she felt the local branch of her
employer in Finland had been nothing but supportive of her
two maternity leaves, and that she and Olli had been able to
reintegrate quickly. “Once we got back to work after the first
kid, we both discovered that it was pretty easy to get back on
track at work. I don’t feel I have to worry about that now with
the second baby.”
Some other Nordic countries have even more helpful
arrangements to facilitate the experience of working parents,
first in providing parental leaves, and subsequently in providing
day care. In Sweden families receive 480 days of paid parental
leave—­approximately sixteen months—­to use at any time they
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like before a child turns four, and part of these days can be saved
and used anytime before the child turns twelve. The day care in
Sweden costs even less than in Finland. While Finns often opt
to care for their small children at home for longer periods, other
Nordics tend to return to work when a child reaches the age of
one. In addition to parental leave and universal day care, in most
Nordic countries parents are also entitled to work shorter days
until a child enters its first years of school. And if a young child is
sick, one parent may stay home for several days.
Nordic societies recognize that for individuals to give fully
to their jobs as employees and as parents, they need time to rest,
recuperate, and just enjoy each other’s company. This means
giving workers—­all workers, at the top and the bottom—­
substantial paid vacations every year. In Finland employees earn
two days of paid vacation for each month worked during the
first year of employment, and after that the guaranteed length
of annual paid vacation for full-­time workers is thirty days—­
the equivalent of five weeks. The other Nordic nations have
similar arrangements. Even Hanna and her husband, Olli, in
Helsinki, with their intense jobs, are encouraged by their companies to take full advantage of their substantial paid vacations,
because the time off makes them not only better human beings
but better workers. Olli takes at least five weeks off a year,
Hanna takes six.
It is worth emphasizing that no employer of any size in
Nordic countries can deny parents access to any of these policies.
They are enshrined at the national level. Inspired by the Nordic
theory of love, this is the commitment that Nordic societies have
made to families—­and, more specifically, to children.
Although all these social policies might seem geared primarily toward parents, there is another way of looking at them:
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as primarily ensuring a good life for children. In this sense the
modern Nordic goal of supporting every individual’s personal
liberty to the greatest extent possible actually begins at the very
beginning of every individual’s life, when they are newborn.
From a Nordic perspective a failure to ensure sufficient parental leave is nothing short of a violation of fundamental human
rights—­specifically, of a child’s basic human right to be cared
for, to be nurtured, and to have parents who are able and present to do the job and do it well.
This attitude is anything but altruistic. In the Nordic view
ensuring a child’s fundamental rights to be properly cared for is
an investment in the future of the society. Supporting the psychological, physiological, and financial well-­being of families
through paid parental leaves, sick days, and genuinely recuperative vacations helps ensure that children grow into healthy
and productive members of society rather than into prisoners,
patients, or the unemployed. Subsidized day care, meanwhile,
lets able-­bodied mothers and fathers get back to economically
productive work, and gives all children the benefit of early-­
childhood education. Parents retain the primary responsibility
for raising their children, of course, but society supports them
in the task, because doing so is good for individual children and
beneficial to society as a whole.
An American friend of mine in New York once fumed to
me about a female colleague of his who was asking to work
part-­time from home after having children. In the man’s opinion this would make life harder for her colleagues. “She chose
to have children,” he said angrily. “Now she wants everyone else
to accommodate her choices. It’s not our problem.” In a Nordic
country you’d be hard-pressed to hear such an unforgiving
view, even among the childless. Still, I could certainly see his
point. As a person without children myself, I too had worked
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longer hours than my colleagues with small children, and had
paid taxes that were higher than my taxes might otherwise have
been in order to support the cost of their parental leaves and day-­
care ser­vices. However, I still thought of children’s well-­being as
everyone’s benefit, and their poverty or unhappiness as everyone’s problem. In addition, a child’s right to a good childhood
seemed to me inalienable, and certainly not subordinate to the
comforts of adults. Perhaps most important, though, I was just
being selfish: I knew that if I did ever have children of my own,
exactly those same support structures would be there for me.
In addition, if I ever had my own kids in Finland, I could
look forward to one of my country’s most beloved traditions,
something that Americans would find extremely strange:
receiving my very own baby box.
O F B A BY B OX E S A N D B O O M E R A N G K I D S
One of the most illuminating collisions of cultures I came
across during my first years in the United States was an article published on the Web site of the Atlantic: “Finland’s ‘Baby
Box’: Gift from Santa Claus or Socialist Hell?” The American
author, a political scientist named Dominic Tierney, described
for American readers one of Finland’s most uncontroversial and beloved traditions: a box filled with brand-­new baby
equipment, including clothes, bedding, moisturizing cream, a
baby toothbrush, a reusable diaper set, a chew toy, and a picture book, that is sent to families of all newborns. The box itself
is also specially designed to be used as a crib, and has a little
built-­in mattress. Finns think this special delivery helps new
families who are tight on money, and it’s certainly convenient
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for families who are busy. New parents can opt out of the box,
and receive instead a payment of $150, but most families take
the box. The box also encourages everyone to visit the maternity clinic before giving birth, since the box is only delivered
after your first appointment. My friends in Finland praise the
baby box: What first-­time parents would ever think of buying
baby nail clippers or a bath thermometer in advance? Many of
them use the sturdy box as the baby’s first bed. Finland’s baby
box is perhaps one of the first tangible expressions of the Nordic
theory of love. Your parents will certainly do their best to love
you, but you’re not left entirely dependent on their resources at
the start of your life.
Tierney, however, anticipated a probable reaction to all this
in the United States: “The baby box might strike some Americans as the epitome of the nanny state. Can’t ­people get their
own crib?” Finnish parents who aren’t destitute can certainly
buy their own crib—­in fact I’m pretty sure all of them eventually do. But for parents with less means or just fewer friends
and family, the baby box is vital, and because it’s sent to everyone, there’s no stigma attached. It’s also a great deal, since the
government, as the nation’s largest purveyor, can negotiate a
terrific price on the contents of the box. The clothes come in
cheerful colors with designs that change every so often. One
year, the graphic design students at Aalto University in Helsinki
competed to create a stylish look for the box itself. And just in
case an American might assume that Finnish playgrounds each
winter become a sea of identical, government-­issued snowsuits
that call to mind a communist children’s brigade, I can assure
you that Finnish parents swap, inherit, and buy most of their
children’s clothing beyond what comes in the box. On the whole
Finns tend to see the baby box as a delightful rite of passage,
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and a symbolic welcome from society at large. It says: We honor
your choice to have children, and we support you in the adventure; you’re not alone.
America has its own version of the baby box, the baby
shower. It’s hard to imagine many occasions that are more full of
promise and love than a party where family and friends gather
to give the parents-­to-­be baby-­related gifts. At the same time
the American baby shower is also symbolic of what’s to come.
A family’s resources and connections will affect not only what
a child receives at a baby shower but whether a child goes on to
get good medical care, good day care, enough parenting, and a
good education. The poorest families in America can get some
assistance from social programs or scholarships, but for the increasingly beleaguered middle class as well as the well-­to-­do,
the accident of birth confers advantage, or disadvantage, as the
case may be.
Policies based on the Nordic theory of love don’t disappear
because a child starts to grow up and is no longer a helpless toddler. On the contrary, Nordic societies believe that helping children develop a healthy independence from the random lottery
of their parents’ resources, connections, and skills is arguably
even more important when children begin to transition toward
adulthood. In a variety of ways Nordic societies continue to help
children attain a degree of logistical independence from their
parents as the children mature.
But first let’s return to Tierney, because it is precisely this
possibility that occurs to him. In his article on the Finnish baby
box, he echoes the sentiments many Americans might have
about the potential perils of the encroaching nanny state: “Isn’t
there a slippery slope here? When the baby has outgrown its
first set of clothes, why doesn’t the state provide a second baby
box, followed by a child box, and then an adult box?”
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It’s a fair question. And the answer to this question lies in a
recent phenomenon that I had never heard of until I moved to
America: “boomerang kids.”
Some years ago an American sociologist named Katherine S.
Newman noticed that since the 1970s, the number of Americans
between the ages of thirty and thirty-­four who were living with
their parents had risen by half. The number of young adults in
their late twenties and thirties who had never left the nest at all
was also rising. The phenomenon was particularly pronounced
in the United States, but it was visible in other places such as
Japan, Italy, and Spain as well. “Why,” wondered Newman, “in
the world’s most affluent societies, are young (and not so young)
adults unable to stand on their own two feet?”
Newman’s team discovered a variety of stresses that were
prolonging the dependency of children on their parents, causing
these grown children to “boomerang” back home. Globalization
was dragging down young ­people’s wages. Helicopter parenting
and consumerism were creating children who preferred expensive shoes and vacations to paying for their own rent and groceries, and parents were continuing to indulge them. In families
where old-­fashioned ideas persisted, young women were avoiding leaving home to get married because if they did, they would
be expected to become the chief caretaker not just of their own
children but of their in-­laws and grandparents, too. The pressures of modern life, in combination with the persistence of social
structures from the past, were changing young p­ eople’s experience of adulthood, essentially preventing them from growing up.
Then Newman turned her attention to another part of the
world: the Nordic region. “Citizens of Norway, Denmark, Finland, and Sweden could be forgiven for wondering what the
ruckus is about. . . . Young p­ eople typically leave home at age
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eighteen in Stockholm or Oslo. Living with one’s parents in
Copenhagen or Helsinki past the age of eighteen will set tongues
wagging; it’s a social curiosity.”
Newman was seeing the results of the Nordic theory of love
in action. As children mature toward adulthood, Nordic social
policies help them depend less and less on their parents for logistical and financial support. Just a few major examples: Nordic
college students are not dependent on their parents for college
tuition, as university studies are mostly free of charge, nor must
they later try to make their way into the world saddled with
huge student loans. College students are also not dependent on
their parents for living expenses; instead they receive student
stipends until they graduate. Nordic young adults are not forced
to move back in with their parents, because they can qualify for
decent affordable housing or rent subsidies. If economic times
are tough and they have trouble finding a job at first, unemployment benefits are also substantial enough for them to live on.
Since young ­people usually lack work history, the payments are
low, and even benefits aligned with previous earnings drop significantly after a year or two, but some form of cash assistance
continues to be available. In return unemployed ­people are required to visit councilors at employment offices and show proof
of serious efforts to find work or education. All told, thanks to
these various forms of freedom from the old-­fashioned logistical
dependence on one’s parents, children in Nordic countries have
an easier time successfully managing the transition to adulthood.
What a disaster, an American might think, that young
­people could end up on welfare straight out of school. And
the American-­style family-­support model has its upside. Relationships between parents and their grown children seem to
be tighter in the United States than in the Nordic countries,
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whether out of free will or by necessity. But the increasing
number of boomerang kids shows that the need to be dependent
on one’s parents as an adult can be just as debilitating, corrosive,
and downright damaging to a person’s sense of independence,
maturity, and self-­reliance as other forms of assistance. In fact a
good argument can be made that dependence on family can be
even more damaging. Rather than being able at least to live on
one’s own, boomerang kids end up regressing to the arrangements of childhood. The Nordic theory of love would hold that
the relationship between parents and grown children ought to
become one of equals, so that they can express love, affection,
and support for one another as self-­sufficient adults. Instead
boomerang kids and their parents must revert to a complex and
prolonged negotiation of financial and psychological dependency, which easily becomes laced with embarrassment, anxiety,
resentment, and guilt.
In addition, when family is all that is left to cushion individuals against the ever-­harsher realities of life, a deeper, more
insidious corrosion can start to eat away at the fundamental relationships of the family. The challenges of our economically
uncertain times are taking a greater and greater toll on those
families who have fewer resources available to support either
their young or their adult children, and in the United States that
increasingly includes not just the poor but ever larger swaths of
the middle class. For Americans who love family, the irony of
this sad state of affairs couldn’t be more poignant. One of the
main casualties of America’s excessive dependence on family
support is turning out to be marriage itself.
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M A R R I AG E M I S S E S T H E P O I N T
In January 2014, Senator Marco Rubio of Florida gave a speech
on the fiftieth anniversary of Lyndon B. Johnson’s famous War
on Poverty. “For most Americans, their primary aspiration is to
achieve a better life,” Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, said.
“For some, that means becoming wealthy, and there is nothing
wrong with that. But for most, they just want to be able to live
a happy and fulfilling life. To earn a livable wage in a good job.
To have the time to spend with family and do the things they
enjoy. To be able to retire with security. And to give their own
kids a chance to do as well or better than themselves.”
I could imagine any Nordic politician saying exactly the
same thing. These are universal dreams for ­people in all countries. Rubio then went on to mention the growth of income inequality in America, which he found startling, and talked about
the forces that he felt were keeping poor Americans down: the
loss of low-­skill jobs, an expensive tax code, burdensome regulations, and an unsustainable national debt. He lamented the
lack of social mobility, and mentioned possible solutions, such as
requiring that the long-­term unemployed take training courses
in order to continue receiving unemployment benefits—­a policy
that Finland has had in place for years. But he also said something that you’d be unlikely to hear in any Nordic country:
“The truth is, the greatest tool to lift children and families from
poverty is one that decreases the probability of child poverty by
82 percent. But it isn’t a government-­spending program. It’s
called marriage.”
This sounds romantic and uplifting. Who’d oppose marriage? What this statement is actually saying, though, is that
the solution to the financial and logistical struggles of Ameri-
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can families in the twenty-­first century is decidedly not to do
what every other modern industrialized nation has done—­that
is, providing sensible support for children, such as paid parental
leave, or other universal policies that protect the basic rights of
children. No. According to this American line of thinking, the
number-­one best solution to the problem of ­people not having
enough money is marriage.
To a Nordic ear, the idea of promoting marriage, one of
the most precious of human experiences, as a policy solution to
poverty sounds like something from the distant past. Marriage
today shouldn’t be used to force p­ eople into a pact of financial
dependency as it was in the old days, back when every decent
person—­especially every decent woman—­sacrificed his or her
true desires and set aside any qualms about the union for the
sake of familial legacy and property. This is exactly the sort of
old-fashioned arrangement that modernity is supposed to have
freed us from.
Protecting that freedom and opportunity is what the
Nordic theory of love is all about. Marriage today should be a
commitment by two individuals who want to give their love
and care freely, as unencumbered and self-­sufficient equals.
That they choose to enter the relationship purely out of love is
exactly what creates such a profound bond. The stoic, taciturn
Nordics turn out to be some of the most genuine romantics on
earth.
Nevertheless Rubio’s proposal admittedly has a certain unfortunate and inevitable logic. In the United States, surprising
as it may sound, ­couples who live together with their kids are
usually married; unmarried mothers are, for all practical purposes, single parents. Worried about this fact, commentators
point to studies showing that children born outside marriage
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are more likely to live in poverty, to fail in school, and to suffer
physiological, social, and emotional problems.
To someone from a Nordic country, it is perfectly logical
that American single-­parent families are poorer than families
with two parents. Obviously it’s harder to raise children on one
income, and the American government doesn’t provide sufficient support for single parents. Curiously many Americans see
the same situation and manage to come to the opposite conclusion.
They conclude that the decline of marriage and the rise of child
poverty are, indeed, the government’s fault—­but not because the
government has left single-­parent families to their own devices,
as a Nordic person might suggest. Rather many Americans say
it is because excessive government programs have made single
parenting more attractive than getting married.
The benefits that American single parents receive are
actually downright pathetic compared with the benefits they receive in most advanced nations, including the Nordic countries.
When Legal Momentum, a women’s advocacy group, looked
at single mothers in seventeen high-­income nations, American
single mothers came out the worst off. They had the highest
poverty rate, were most likely to lack health-care coverage, got
the least income support, and could only dream of the parental
leaves, sick days, and public day-­care ser­vices that single parents
in other countries can rely on.
By this strange American logic, which blames the troubles
of single parents on too much government help, if anyone in
the world should be motivated to churn out babies outside of
wedlock and mooch off the state, it should be Nordic parents,
with all those generous policies to support children, including
a variety of helpful cash benefits alongside affordable day care.
So has the Nordic theory of love, and all the supportive
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family policies it has spawned, indeed caused Nordic families
to fall apart?
If you look at the statistics on Nordic children born outside
marriage, you might well conclude that the Nordic family has
been decimated. Nordics have some of the highest rates of children born outside marriage of all wealthy countries. Sweden,
Norway, and Iceland actually have more births outside marriage than within it. The trend is a bit less pronounced in Denmark and Finland, but it’s still clear, with more out-­of-­wedlock
births than in the United States.
Is that the most useful measurement, though? It’s worth
stopping to ask whether in this day and age, marriage per se
is still the relevant indicator it might once have been. When
you look at statistics about family structure instead, the picture
changes dramatically. It turns out that Nordic children actually
are more likely to have two parents in their home than American children are, even if their parents are not married.
The sociologist Katherine S. Newman has written about this
phenomenon as well: “The patterns of family formation Americans associate with the poor—­single-­parent households, cohabitation, and out-­
of-­
wedlock childbearing—­
are very common
across the classes in the Nordic countries.” Inspired by the Nordic
theory of love, Nordic societies have simply chosen to embrace the
sorts of flexible arrangements that go with modernity, and to recognize p­ eople’s fundamental humanity nonetheless. In Finland
this acceptance extends even to the highest office in the land. Finland’s president, Tarja Halonen, had been a single mother, and at
the time of her election, she was in a long-­term relationship with a
man who wasn’t her child’s father and didn’t live with her. (After
the election, he did move with her to the presidential residence,
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and eventually the ­couple did get married.) Outsiders to the region
often imagine that Nordic culture binds Nordic ­people to some
sort of Lutheran morality code. However, in reality Nordic societies have already accepted that today’s adult relationships come
in many shapes and forms, and that the focus of all family policies
should be on supporting individuals within families, regardless of
how those families want to arrange their private affairs.
Married and cohabiting c­ ouples in Nordic countries, as well
as single parents, all get more or less the same benefits for their
children, and if a child has only one parent, society steps in to
support that parent with his or her emotional, financial, and
logistical hardships—­not for the benefit of the parent, mind
you, but in order to secure the best possible childhood for that
child. The Nordic way is not to push single parents to find a
new spouse; not being married itself isn’t the problem.
Still, to be fair to Rubio, aren’t the Nordic countries at least in
danger of creating their own “welfare queens,” who keep having
children and milking the government for cash, without ever
working themselves? After all, in Finland a woman could easily
spend six years at home without losing her job, if she were to have
two or three children in a row and take care of each of them at
home for two or three years. The answer is that the key to keeping welfare queens—­or, for that matter, welfare kings—­at bay is
linking a person’s benefits to his or her previous salary. If a woman
has not worked at all before having a child, her maternity benefits
are going to be very small. In Finland the monthly maternity benefit for someone who has not worked before giving birth is about
six hundred dollars before taxes. The allowance for taking care
of a one-­or a two-­year-­old at home is even less than that. It’s not
the kind of money that entices parents to forget about jobs, even
if they might qualify for additional assistance. Extended time on
minimum benefits is not what most p­ eople want from life.
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Parental leaves are meant to be breaks in a steady career, not
a way of life, and Nordic policies ensure that for the vast majority of p­ eople, that is exactly what they are. As a result Nordic
single parents are just as or even more likely to be working than
American single parents—­in large part because they can. While
in the United States single parents can face tremendous obstacles in trying to keep their jobs while caring for a newborn, and
additional difficulties affording day care and transportation to
work, in Nordic countries single parents are actively helped and
pushed to continue their careers.
The American fear that government assistance automatically weakens families, encourages single parenthood, and
­creates welfare queens is not borne out by the experience of the
Nordic countries. Although the reason for this may seem counterintuitive, it’s exactly because Nordic societies do not subsidize
marriage and the joint enterprise of a family that the family
becomes stronger. From the perspective of implementing the
Nordic theory of love, focusing on the family is a mistake. A
family will not function well as a team unless it is first composed of strong, self-­sufficient individuals. So instead Nordic
societies work to ensure independence for the individual members ­involved. For fathers and mothers the result is to make
the ­prospect of remaining engaged in the life of the family less
difficult. This approach creates fewer strains between family
members, because those individuals don’t have to make the
sort of extreme sacrifices that can cause them to lose their independence, which so often forces families in America to fall
apart—­or stops them from forming in the first place.
­and parThe most plausible explanation for why Americans—
­
ticularly working-­class Americans—­are not getting married
anymore has nothing to do with lack of morals, and nothing to
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do with government welfare programs. It comes from Jennifer
M. Silva, a sociologist and author of Coming Up Short: Working-­
Class Adulthood in an Age of Uncertainty. Silva spent several
years interviewing young working-­class Americans about their
lives.
“These are p­ eople bouncing from one temporary job to the
next; dropping out of college because they can’t figure out financial aid forms or fulfill their major requirements; relying on
credit cards for medical emergencies; and avoiding romantic
commitments because they can take care of only themselves,”
Silva has written. “Increasingly disconnected from institutions
of work, family and community, they grow up by learning that
counting on others will only hurt them in the end. Adulthood
is not simply being delayed but dramatically reimagined along
lines of trust, dignity and connection and obligation to others.”
These young adults are finding that even their own families
can’t shield them from the effects of globalization and the challenges of American life today. Worse, they’re learning to view
another person’s company as a potential burden instead of a
source of support. If you can barely take care of yourself, joining
forces with someone else who is also struggling could just make
matters worse. As Silva puts it, “The insecurities and uncertainties of their daily lives have rendered commitment a luxury they
can’t afford.” Yet, true to their American upbringing, they are
quick to blame themselves for not managing to build a more
stable life. They have nothing to compare their American
existence with, and they don’t realize how out-­of-­date their own
society’s structures are for the challenges they face. Tragically,
America appears to be raising a new generation of young ­people
afraid to form bonds at all.
It’s impossible not to be shocked by how old-­fashioned these
problems and debates sound if you’re from a Nordic country,
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where these issues are hardly debated anymore. Declining marriage rates and changing family structures are irrelevant, if
they’re considered problems at all, and workplace flexibility has
long ago been guaranteed by rules enforcing healthy amounts
of paid leave. Nordic societies have already transitioned toward
the primary and more contemporary goal of supporting the independence of the individual, so that the individual can then
afford to make supportive and loving commitments to other
­people, like pairing up and starting a family. In this sense the
Nordic approach has truly become more laissez-­
faire than
America’s. The result has been—­no surprise to any Nordic
citizen—­stronger families.
Another result has been something that makes those families even more resilient: stronger women.
S T R O N G E R M OT H E R S , H A P P I E R FAT H E R S
The Nordic countries as a whole are particularly proud of their
achievements in securing equal rights for women. In Finland it
has become common for women to hold close to half the seats
in parliament; the offices of prime minister and president have
both been held by women; and about half the cabinet ministers
are typically women. The equalization of gender roles is by no
means complete, but compared with the United States, the difference in Nordic countries is apparent everywhere.
So I admit I was surprised by how much parenting in
America is still the woman’s responsibility. In most cases it is
the woman who has battled her employers for parental leave,
researched day-­care options, and arranged work around her
children’s schedules. She takes them to the doctor, she prepares
school lunches, she stays home from work when they’re sick.
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American mothers spend about twice as much time caring for
their children as do fathers, and when it comes to housework
in general, American women spend about triple the amount of
time on it that men do. American women spend far more time
than men doing such unpaid work—­substantially more than
Nordic women do in relation to Nordic men. Of course there
are exceptions. It is more common now for American men to
become stay-­at-­home dads while the mother works, but they are
still a small minority.
In Finland fathers routinely change diapers, cook meals,
pick the kids up from day care, and sit by the playground. For
my male friends in Finland, posting updates and photos on
Facebook that depict them caring for their infants or toddlers is
something to “humblebrag” about, to the extent that it’s become
a point of pride and a kind of competition. “It’s almost like
you’re not a real man anymore if you haven’t done your share of
diaper duty,” a Finnish father told me.
Mothers usually stay home for at least a year or even two,
and fathers might stay home for another six months or so while
the mother returns to work. Partly women take more time off
because maternity clinics in Finland promote the World Health
Organization’s recommendation that children be exclusively
breast-­fed until the age of six months, and continue to be breast-­
fed, while also receiving complementary foods, until the age of
one or even later. The more educated the mother, it turns out,
the longer she breast-­feeds.
Americans often view maternity leave as a time for a mother
to recover from giving birth, and anything longer as an entitlement that unfairly gives women benefits that men and their
childless colleagues don’t get. Nordic societies see this question
differently. For starters, in the Nordic view long leaves for both
parents are seen as crucial to allow the child to form strong
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bonds with both the mother and the father. The other rationale
is that long leaves not just for mothers but for fathers allow both
parents to get into the groove of sharing responsibilities at home
and work equally, from the beginning. This, in turn, supports
gender equality.
Gender equality in Nordic societies is thus not an abstract
goal, pursued for its own sake. Instead it serves the larger
goals of the Nordic theory of love: that all individuals be self-­
sufficient, so that they can give more purely and generously of
their affection and care. Parental leave policies that give time
to both parents promote exactly this result. Between spouses, a
more equal division of housework on the one hand, and a more
equal division of paid work on the other, increases both spouses’
autonomy. Both parents earn their own money, and both parents have their own fully developed relationships with their
children. By ensuring independence for each parent this way,
the family as a whole grows stronger. Spouses avoid the dependencies and resentments that arise when one person pursues a
career and controls the money, and the other person manages
all the housework and the children. And in the sad event of a
divorce, since both parents already have their own careers and
their own intimate knowledge of how to care for their children, they can remain stronger both financially and emotionally
even on their own, which is good for the kids. To put it bluntly,
­fathers stick around and women can support themselves, reducing the risk of the kind of poor single parenthood that worries
American policy makers.
To encourage men to take advantage of their parental leaves,
the Nordic countries have launched special paid leave that is
“daddy-­only” time off. If, after a mother returns to work, the
father doesn’t take advantage of this special chunk of leave,
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the family loses it. Iceland has become famous for its so-­called
3+3+3 model, in which a total of nine months of parental leave
are divided into three equal blocks of three months each. One of
these blocks can be used by either parent, but of the two remaining blocks, one belongs to the mother and one to the father. If
the father doesn’t take his personal allotment, the mother is not
eligible to take it instead.
In Norway the father similarly has a special share of ten
weeks that are daddy-­only, and in Sweden daddies get an exclusive three months. In Finland the father’s personal share is
nine weeks, of which three can be taken at the same time as the
mother. Of course fathers can stay home even longer, if they
choose to use part or all of the leave available to either parent.
Daddy-­only leaves have made a huge difference. Their
introduction has encouraged Nordic fathers to take a much
greater share of parental leaves than before, and the impact
on families is profound. Studies in several countries show that
when fathers as well as mothers take parental leaves, the family
dynamic changes for the better, with men taking a more active
role in raising children. Men also participate more in household
tasks such as cooking or shopping, and women end up spending
a fairer share of their time in paid work.
To a more old-­fashioned way of thinking, where the man is
seen as the sole breadwinner for the family, this sort of change
might not be considered progress. But there’s another way of
looking at it. Even in the United States more and more men
are realizing that they’ve been denied the satisfactions of bonding with their own children, and denied the right to help raise
them. Surveys show that increasing numbers of American men
want to take paternity leave. Unfortunately they’re often stymied in this by employers who don’t offer such leaves.
Even when employers do offer paternity leave, American
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fathers still have a hard time taking advantage of it, for fear
of being marked as less committed to the company, and thus
hurting their chances for promotion, or worse. Not just in the
United States but in many other countries, men regularly face
harassment in the workplace if they cut back work hours to
help care for their children. Part of the whole point of Nordic
daddy-­only leaves is that these policies are implemented at the
national level, making fathering an equally legitimate pursuit
for all men. The Nordic example has shown that employers and
coworkers much more willingly accept a man’s decision to stay
home when they know that otherwise, his family would lose
their right to that time and money.
The results in Nordic societies are obvious—­in the workplace, yes, but also at the playground. A Finnish friend of mine,
Saska, had two children in the early 1990s, and then, after getting remarried, had another two children twenty years later.
“When I became a father for the first time, I was the odd one
out, sitting by the sandbox with all the mothers,” he told me.
“Now I’m just one of many fathers sitting there by the sandbox.” But, he added with a laugh, “They’re all twenty years
younger than me.” While two decades ago a father might have
been embarrassed to stay home, now Finnish fathers are more
likely to be ashamed if they don’t take time off, and many feel
a responsibility to be involved in most aspects of their children’s
lives, whether doctor’s appointments, day care, or school field
trips. The daily grind with young kids can numb the mind of
any adult, of course. However, many Finnish men are discovering an unexpected bonus of more-­involved fathering, which
has nothing to do with the kids. Participating in one’s share
of toilet training actually seems to forge closer bonds not just
with one’s children but also with one’s fellow parent, leading to
a happier and deeper relationship. For many of my own male
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friends in Finland, it’s no longer a question of whether or not to
take paternity leave; taking time off for fathering has become
the normal way of life. And as far as I can tell, they’re all glad
they’ve done so.
Their spouses—­the mothers—­have been glad too, of course,
but also surprised at how well it’s worked out. “I can still remember how great it felt when my husband was home on parental leave, and my son cried for him instead of me when he
fell,” said Kaarina, a Finnish freelance writer. She and her husband, a craftsman specializing in building custom stone walls,
split their parental leaves evenly, taking turns every six months.
“It felt wonderful, because it reduced my guilt,” she explained.
“As a mother you always wonder whether in the end it really
should be you who stays at home—­if it’s wrong for a mother to
be out there working. Basically you’re just overestimating your
own importance. And when my son’s first reaction was to cry
for his dad, I knew that our choice was right, and that the child
was perfectly cared for. That it really doesn’t have to be always
me. I had always known it rationally, but at that moment I believed it emotionally. It was a huge relief.”
THE TROUBLE WITH SUPERMOMS
The admiration I’ve long felt for American women couldn’t
have been greater when Marissa Mayer, an executive at Google,
was named CEO of Yahoo, even though she was pregnant at
the time. She promptly announced that her maternity leave
would last just a few weeks, and went on to build a nursery
next to her office so she could see her baby all day. I doubted
whether a Finnish woman could be hard core enough to do the
same, no matter how high up the corporate ladder. The Face-
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book executive Sheryl Sandberg, in her book Lean In, encourages women to strive for more responsibility at work despite
the demands of motherhood. Her stories of pumping milk
during conference calls, and combing through her children’s
hair searching for lice while flying on a private jet to a conference, were tales from the world of American supermoms, and
that world has always struck me as no place for merely mortal
Nordic mothers.
Nordic mothers work, but rarely at the same relentless pace
as many American mothers. While the slower pace and time
off can certainly be healthier for mothers and their children, it
would be disingenuous not to admit that long maternity leaves
can also be a double-­edged sword. Taking too much time off
can deny women crucial work experience, as well as promotions
and raises, not to mention some of their income, along with
pension contributions. In addition employers may discriminate
against young women in hiring, if it seems likely that a new
female employee will soon drop out for a few years to have kids.
Sadly for Nordic women, statistics substantiate some of these
fears. For example, for all the gender equality in Nordic societies, Nordic women are still less likely to work as managers than
are American women. So, is the answer for Nordic women to
become American-­style supermoms, “leaning in” more at the
office while also doing full duty as parents?
When we compare the plight of Nordic and American
mothers, a paradox emerges. In the Nordic countries, one parent
is expected to stay home for the first year or so of a child’s life,
and yes, the mother often ends up taking more of that time off
from her career than does the father. In the United States, on the
other hand, it is perfectly acceptable, and often compulsory, for
both parents to return to work very soon, even when the child
is still only a few months or even weeks old. The mother then
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becomes a supermom, heroically juggling her job and her kids.
While this is also not ideal for American women, at least the
American mother doesn’t miss out on six or nine or even twelve
months of her career with every new child, the way a Nordic
mother would.
But that is not the whole story. In the United States it’s
also perfectly acceptable, and quite common, for one parent to
drop out of the workforce entirely and never return—­or not
for many, many years. In the vast majority of cases, the parent
who drops out of the workforce in the United States is the
mother. And it seems that this trend has actually been increasing. Among American mothers with children under the age of
eighteen, nearly a third of them have become stay-­at-­home
mothers, the highest level in two decades, according to 2012
statistics from the Pew Research Center. In the Nordic countries, by contrast, for either parent to abandon work entirely for
parenting is seldom seen as necessary, or even desirable. After
the first year or so of parental leave in a Nordic country, or after
the first c­ ouple of years in Finland, where mothers tend to stay
home a bit longer than their Nordic neighbors, both parents are
expected to go right back to work. As a result, in all the Nordic
countries, women over the age of twenty-­five participate in the
workforce at higher rates than do women in the United States.
So while America may have more supermoms, it turns out that
asking women to become supermoms is not a solution. Instead
women are just dropping out.
One of the reasons that American women so often seem
stuck between two restrictive options—­supermom or stay-­at-­
home mom—­is that day care in the United States is so absurdly
expensive. While close to a third of American mothers may
be giving up their careers and staying home, that still leaves
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more than a half of American two-­parent families in a situation
where both parents are working, and thus in desperate need of
child care. For these families the astronomical fees for day care
are a disaster. In the United States the average annual cost of
full-­time child care for an infant in a day-­care center ranged
from $4,800 per year in Mississippi to $22,600 in the District
of Columbia in 2014, with the cost exceeding $10,000 per year
in twenty states, according to the nonprofit group Child Care
Aware. Care for a four-­year-­old costs only slightly less. If a
family has more than one child, as most do, these costs naturally
double or triple. The federal government and certain states
might subsidize costs for low-­income families, and tax credits
also help, but even so, paying for child care takes up a huge
chunk of the American family budget, especially for those with
less-­than-­stellar salaries.
Among my own friends and acquaintances in the United
States, most are caught in the middle: not wealthy enough to
have one parent stay home while maintaining a middle-­class
lifestyle, but also not wealthy enough to pay for nannies or day
care without difficulties. Many of them, ever the heroic superparents, demonstrate tremendous creativity in solving their
day-­care dilemmas. They work part-­time and swap child-­care
duties with friends midweek; they share nannies, enlist relatives, and work from home. They cajole employers for flexible schedules, and some have even gone into debt to pay for a
good preschool. Many testify to living constantly on the brink
of financial insecurity. For the fortunate ones their parents help
shoulder the costs.
Much as I admire all this resourcefulness among my American friends, I also can’t help wondering: Is this a smart way for a
society in the twenty-­first century to allocate its precious human
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resources? All this creativity in figuring out child care uses up
vast amounts of everyone’s energy and brainpower, and steals
away many hours and days that could be better spent. It always
seems to me a surprising waste of time and potential.
For citizens of Nordic societies, for the most part, these problems simply don’t exist. A simple and universal commitment
at the national level to paid parental leaves of a realistic length
alleviates much of the financial stress and workplace demands
on families with babies. Then, when children are a little older,
a straightforward commitment to making high-­quality child
care affordable and universal makes life for working parents far
more manageable; statistics show that between the ages of three
and five, the vast majority of Nordic children are being cared
for in high-­quality professional day-­care facilities. The result
is that Nordic women can simultaneously have careers and be
moms at substantially higher rates than American women, and
all without having to be supermoms.
It’s true that Nordic women have room for improvement in
one area compared to their counterparts in the United States:
American women who do work may reach higher positions in
their companies. However, as a whole, American women are
falling behind. Various studies show that the ideal arrangement
for women’s careers seems to be paid parental leaves that are
generous, but not too generous—­less than two years, or maybe
even less than a year—­and, crucially, the sharing of parental
leaves, as well as any reductions in working hours required for
parenting, evenly with men.
When the World Economic Forum measures the gap between men and women in different countries around the globe
in four fundamental categories—­(1) economic participation and
opportunity, (2) educational attainment, (3) health and survival,
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and (4) political empowerment—­Nordic nations consistently
rank as the most equal societies on earth. By comparison, how
does the United States fare? In 2015 the United States ranked
twenty-­eighth. The annual report has specifically noted that in
the Nordic countries, women’s participation in the labor force
is among the highest in the world; salary gaps between women
and men are among the lowest in the world; and overall, despite
a slight disadvantage for Nordic women in corporate management, women in Nordic societies nevertheless still have abundant opportunities to rise to positions of leadership.
The Nordic theory of love has provided a vision: how independent individuals can actually create stronger and more
resilient familial teams than spouses who are tied to each other
in relationships that are unequal, or that involve financial and
logistical dependencies. In turn, the Nordic countries have provided the policies to make this vision come true: straightforward
social policies, at the national level, that make sense for families
in the twenty-­first century—­and that could be adopted by any
country that wants to achieve similar results.
Continuing to live in the past is costing Americans dearly.
American families pay in lost income, in stress, and in
hardship—­all of which spawn an enormous burden of anxiety
that I could observe all around me, and that I started to suffer
from myself soon after I settled on American shores. American women in particular are paying a terrible price, in lost opportunities. American children are paying a price, too, in ways
we might not even understand yet, because society is not protecting their right to high-­quality day care. And the American
economy is paying as well. A 2014 report by the White House
Council of Economic Advisers noted that policies such as paid
family leave, flexible work schedules, and affordable child care
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that help women work can make a significant contribution to
economic growth.
But at the most basic level, it can all be said simply: The
American family deserves better.
FA M I L I E S F O R TO M O R R OW
How could the United States as a nation begin to address these
challenges? For starters Americans could look at reforms that
are already under way. In addition to California, New Jersey
and Rhode Island have instituted statewide paid parental
leave policies for mothers and fathers alike, funded entirely by
employee contributions, with no direct costs to employers.
Many companies have started to offer their own paid parental
leaves, with Silicon Valley giants like Google, Facebook, and
Yahoo leading the way. If some of America’s most forward-­
thinking businesses and states are doing it voluntarily, why not
level the playing field, embrace the future, and institute more
realistic paid parental leaves as a national policy? Would that be
too costly for American businesses across the board, and for the
American economy as a whole?
So far California’s paid family leave policies have demonstrated that when more generous parental leaves are offered,
American employees gratefully take them, and families clearly
benefit. The California program allows eligible workers just
six weeks of paid family leave, which certainly isn’t much by
Nordic standards. However, according to the 2013 Economic
Report of the President, this alone more than doubled the overall use of maternity leave, increasing it from around three to
six or seven weeks for the typical new mother, which is a great
start to a better life for babies, not just for moms. A 2010 survey
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by the economist Eileen Appelbaum and the sociologist Ruth
Milkman, studying the results of the California initiative,
demonstrated that thanks to the new policy, mothers were
breast-­feeding longer, and fathers were taking more paternity
leaves. Such developments could certainly be considered small
but promising first steps toward something akin to an American version of the Nordic theory of love.
Implementing better family policies has been difficult, however, because businesses worry about the cost. Indeed, before
the California plan was enacted, the business lobby opposed it
as a “job killer.” To what extent are these fears justified? Six
years into the new California leave program, the same survey
by Appelbaum and Milkman found that none of the fears that
businesses had harbored about the costs of granting leaves had
materialized. In fact, the vast majority of businesses reported
that the program had a positive effect, or no noticeable effect, on
productivity, profitability, turnover, and employee morale.
Considering such positive results at the state level, it seems
reasonable to hope that America could move toward better
family policies nationwide. At the end of 2013, New York senator Kirsten Gillibrand and Connecticut representative Rosa
DeLauro did introduce a law in Congress called the Family
Act, which built directly on the examples of California and
New Jersey. The law proposed a system of small employer and
employee payroll contributions, which in turn would provide
all workers with up to twelve weeks of partial income during
leaves for having a child, recovering from a serious health condition, and caring for a sick family member. The system would
be run through the Social Security Administration.
The White House, too, has been pursuing improved leave
policies for workers in both small and more significant ways.
President Obama pushed for more paid sick days for workers
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across the country, and better parental leave policies for federal
employees. More significantly, several budgets from the Obama
White House proposed money for a “State Paid Leave Fund” to
help states launch their own paid leave programs.
However, at the national level and in many states, resistance
to such federal initiatives remains powerful. Surely, opponents
say, it would be too expensive to grant American workers more
generous parental leaves—­let alone help them out with universal, high-­quality subsidized day care—­and the American economy would suffer, losing ground in the global race to compete.
But when it comes to family policies and international competitiveness, it increasingly looks as if American politicians may just
not be very well informed.
Increasing paid leave for workers is part of a worldwide trend,
heading in the direction that the Nordic countries have taken.
There is a branch of the United Nations that determines decent
work standards for all workers around the globe; it’s called the
ILO (International Labour Organization), and it has won a
Nobel Peace Prize for its work. The ILO has concluded that
today a reasonable and humane minimum for paid maternity
leave is fourteen weeks, at a pay rate of at least two-­thirds of
previous earnings. To make this work, and work fairly, some
form of public funding is essential for paid family leaves, the
ILO points out. Sticking private companies with the cost of
parental benefits would be unfair for two reasons: the burden
on corporate balance sheets, but also the risk that companies
might start discriminating against women in hiring because of
the higher costs of maternity leaves. More and more countries
are both extending the length of these leaves and increasing the
amount of the benefits.
Americans seem to think that granting such leaves re-
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quires altruism, but that misses the point. Other international
organizations—­the Organization for Economic Co-­operation
and Development (OECD), the European Union (EU), the
World Economic Forum—­now encourage their member nations to guarantee their workers paid parental leaves and subsidized day care. They do so because it’s clear that these things
are good for economic growth. Studies demonstrate the ways
that family-­friendly policies tailored to today’s realities benefit
a country’s economy. Family leave policies and affordable day
care increase women’s participation in the labor force, help employers retain workers, and improve the health of women and
children.
Nations that have enacted such policies have not experienced harm to their businesses or their economies. In addition
their long-­term prospects for economic growth have improved,
because fertility rates have risen. The OECD, the EU, and the
World Economic Forum now pitch these policies to politicians
and business­people alike in terms not of doing good but of
making money. And what these organizations are saying is true.
Any American corporate leader who wants to create healthier,
happier, and more productive employees—­and, crucially, retain
them—­should be lobbying for mandatory universal policies
enacted at the highest levels of government, because that will
prevent competing companies from undercutting their efforts.
When every company must offer the same benefits across the
entire nation, and the burden of paying for parental leaves is
shared through some form of public funding, a fair and level
playing field is created for all businesses, allowing all to benefit.
My friends back in Finland can plan their families knowing that
they have ample parental leave, that the day care is good and
cheap, and that the public health-­care system will take care of
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them. Of course arranging family life is never easy, and most
of my friends also rely on grandparents and other relatives for
help. But if you want to have a family in a Nordic country, you
just go ahead and do so. And once you do, the time and energy
that you spend on your kids can be focused mostly on loving
them, being with them, and raising them, not working so hard
to afford them that you never get to see them.
Everyone complains no matter how good they have it, even
in Finland. But most of this is a matter of tweaking life, not
of trying to secure the fundamentals. It’s almost funny how
frequently the same friends who cheered on my romance with
Trevor and my move to New York now tell me that I shouldn’t
think about money if we want to have kids. Yeah, right, I say
to myself. You try coming to America and having kids, and not
thinking about money!
The Nordic countries have managed not just to bring
more women into the labor force, but in the process to make
the Nordic theory of love a reality. Their overall goal is to support the individual, regardless of gender, and in the process
produce healthier workers, better work-­life balance, and more
well-­being for children and their parents. In strengthening individuals, Nordic societies have empowered them to form even
stronger family teams. There is no reason why the United States
couldn’t do the same.
But there is also another way to strengthen individuals that
involves every society’s most precious resource—its children.
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FOUR
HOW CHILDREN
ACHIEVE
S E C R E T S F O R AT TA I N I N G
E D U C AT I O N A L S U C C E S S
T H E R I S E O F T H E E D U C AT I O N S U P E R P OW E R
When I married Trevor and moved to America, I gained a
wonderful extended family in the United States. Among the
first Americans I got to know well were Trevor’s cousin Holly
and her husband, John. They live in a medium-­size town in
the southeastern United States, and they quickly became two
of my favorite p­ eople in the world. Holly is thoughtful, smart,
and always interested in sharing her experiences and learning
about those of others. John is quick-­witted, funny, and incredibly gracious at welcoming new p­ eople into a group, including
a foreigner like myself. Holly works in academia, John in the
private sector. They are both highly educated and hardworking,
and they have two school-­age children.
After marrying, Trevor and I began to think seriously about
starting a family. I’d accepted by then that it would be a logistical and financial struggle in the United States to care for an
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infant. But what about later, when a child was ready for school?
In an effort to understand what I could expect, I turned to a
mother whose judgment I had come to trust: Holly. What was
it like for her and John to arrange their children’s education?
As Holly described the process, it sounded like the work
of a private investigator. She’d asked countless p­ eople for their
impressions and advice, trying to ascertain the word on the
street, and spent long hours researching different options trying
to narrow down their choices. She visited as many of the preschools in their area in person as she could. All of which, she
added, was exactly what she’d gone through when she’d tried to
find day care a few years earlier.
After identifying a good preschool, Holly continued her research and in-­person visits in order to secure her children the
next rung up the ladder: spots at a good kindergarten and elementary school. “I visited several schools,” Holly told me. “You
could say I was consumed by the question.”
There were pros and cons to consider. The public school in
their neighborhood had performed poorly in recent statewide
tests. On the other hand, while visiting to observe a few classes
there, Holly found the principal impressive and dynamic. She
spoke with families whose children had attended the school and
were happy with it, but she was still bothered by what she called
“the whole public school approach.” From what Holly could tell,
the classes were too large, too many of the assignments involved
rote memorization and problem sheets, and the opportunities
for children to go outside for recess or physical education were
too few. From her research, she was aware of what lay behind
these problems. American public school students were required
to take a barrage of standardized tests, and the results of those
tests could determine a school’s future, for better or worse. With
so much pressure on teachers to improve test results, Holly wor-
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ried that constant test prep would be taking the place of education that could truly engage students in creative learning.
Holly and John couldn’t afford to send two kids to private
school, so there weren’t any private schools on their list. That
changed when friends told them about a private school nearby
that granted financial aid even to middle-­class families. As she
walked around the school and learned about their programs,
she started, as she put it to me, to “salivate.” The school had a
thoughtful and creative curriculum with no standardized testing. It regularly sent students out for recess and PE regardless of
the weather. All students took music, arts, drama, science, and
foreign languages, unlike in the public elementary schools she
visited. When the school came through with the financial aid,
the family decided to go for it, even though paying for the remainder of the tuition was going to be tough. Holly maintained
a resigned sense of irony about the decision. “My goal in sending
them there is not that they get ahead and can go to Harvard,”
she said. “I’m basically sending them to private school so they
can have recess and art.”
I had known that trying to secure a good-­quality and well-­
rounded education for one’s children in America could be a
fraught business, but my conversation with Holly nevertheless
left me in something of a state of shock. The complexity of the
variables and potential costs involved was daunting.
Soon after, I was chatting with a friend of mine back in Finland named Noora, a very attentive, thoughtful, and engaged
mother of two children. She and her husband lived in a little
town in southern Finland, and her daughter was about to start
school. I asked Noora if she had looked into different schools
for her daughter. She had not. They had received a letter from
the municipality assigning their daughter to a school, and even
though a close friend of the family was the principal of another
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school nearby and suggested their daughter go there instead,
Noora and her husband saw no reason to complicate things.
After all, she said without a second thought, both of the public
schools nearby were terrific.
Still thinking back to Holly’s experience, I asked Noora
if she was concerned whether her daughter would do well in
school or not. Noora looked a little surprised by the question.
“I’m sure she’ll do fine,” she said. “I hadn’t even thought about
it.” She paused. “Why do you ask?”
It’s hard for a Finn today to grasp the degree to which education
is a critical and life-­altering topic of discussion in the lives of
­people in other countries. It may also be hard for them to understand why Finland’s education system has been the subject
of such intense interest and scrutiny around the world. When
my new American acquaintances started asking me questions
about Finnish schools, I thought they were simply being polite,
seeking a way to demonstrate interest in my home country. Yet
I soon learned that for my American friends, family, and colleagues, education is a forbidding maze that must constantly
be probed and navigated, full of dangers lurking around every
corner that threaten to thwart the best efforts of a family to help
its children get ahead. American parents are constantly talking
about education because it is a constant and conspicuous source
of anxiety.
A great many Americans now seem to agree that their
education system needs serious reform. Many public schools
are failing, private schools are increasingly competitive and
exorbitantly expensive, and charter schools—­funded by the
government but run by private operators—­have scored some
successes yet have also created new problems and uncertain-
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ties, and they remain limited in their availability. The children
of the rich in America are now outperforming children from
middle-­class and poor families by the widest margins in decades. Families scramble to secure their children a spot in a
good school, and struggle to afford either the cost of a house
in a decent public school district or ever-­increasing tuition for
private school. And of course paying for college gets more and
more difficult as tuition skyrockets. Overall the United States
fares poorly in international comparisons of student achievement. The beneficiaries of the current system mainly seem to
be the for-­profit companies that sell tutoring ser­vices, testing
ser­vices, and, increasingly, education itself to worried parents.
The question on everyone’s mind is, How do we go about improving schools?
From what I remember of my own education in public schools
in Finland—­and tellingly, I don’t remember much—­it was
nothing special. My teachers were kind but mostly boring. Not
unlike many of today’s American public school students, my
Finnish classmates and I learned by rote memorization. I recall
that many students in my middle school were terribly rude to
the teachers. Gym was a traumatizing experience that my generation still talks about like a stint in the army. In our academic
classes we got plenty of homework, and took our share of standardized tests. On international surveys in those days, Finland’s
education ranking was not noteworthy. But since then things
have changed—­dramatically. In the span of a few decades Finland has managed to turn its schools completely around and
­create one of the highest-­achieving public education systems the
world has ever seen.
Outside Finland this education miracle has gained fame
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p­ rimarily through a particular study: the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), conducted every three
years by the OECD, a Paris-­based group whose members include the world’s major industrial powers. The survey compares fifteen-­year-­olds in different countries in reading, math,
and science. Finnish students have ranked at or near the top
in all three subjects on every survey since 2000, neck and neck
with such superachievers as South Korea and Singapore. In the
2012 survey, which focused on mathematics, Finland slipped
slightly. Shanghai took the highest score, with its fellow Asian
cities and countries like Singapore, Hong Kong, and Taiwan
close behind. In Europe, Finland also lost some ground in
math, to the likes of Liechtenstein, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and Estonia. While the competition with other countries
is likely to get only tougher, for all practical purposes Finns
have, so far, remained near the top. As of the 2012 results, in
all three subjects combined Finland ranked third after Korea
and Japan among the thirty-­four OECD countries, and sixth in
mathematics.
How does this compare with the United States? Throughout the same period the performance of American students in
the PISA survey has been middling at best. In 2012 the United
States came in twenty-­first in combined performance in reading, mathematics, and science among the thirty-­four OECD
countries, and in mathematics it performed below average at
twenty-­seventh.
Finland’s success has been especially notable for another
reason. It’s not just that some of its schools have performed well;
almost all of them have. No other country has so consistently
had so little variation in outcomes among schools. Moreover,
within individual schools, the gap between the top-­and bottom-­
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achieving students has been also extraordinarily small, meaning that just about all Finnish students have done really well.
And finally, Finland has achieved these results with remarkable
tranquility. Finnish children get very little homework, their
school days are short, and most children attend their neighborhood schools. My Finnish friend Noora is not the only parent in
Finland who’d be surprised to learn how much effort American
parents put into ensuring their children’s education.
Finland’s unorthodox success has led to a steady stream of
foreign delegations visiting Finnish schools, and to global media
coverage, with report after report marveling at the Finnish education miracle. That has included lots of enthusiastic attention
from ­people in the United States, but also attention from some
Americans who dismiss Finland’s experience as irrelevant. I
was curious whether Finland really had anything to offer the
United States. As I started looking into the history of Finnish
education, I discovered that the mess America is stuck in today
is more or less exactly the same situation that Finland found
itself in decades ago. And in line with the goals of the Nordic
theory of love, the approach Finland took at the time to solve
its own education mess has some profound—­and profoundly
surprising—­implications for America’s choices today.
When Finland emerged from its years of war against the Soviet
Union in the late 1940s, it embarked on a new journey. Finland
was poor, with little in the way of natural resources besides forests, and lacking the legacy of overseas colonization that had
enriched some of its European neighbors. This predicament
forced Finland’s leaders to conclude that Finns could be only
as successful as their brainpower could make them. Individual
Finns also came to see educating the minds of their children as
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the best way for the next generation to get ahead. Education
became Finland’s best hope for preparing its population for a
new economy based not on agriculture or manufacturing, but
on knowledge. Although the future high-­tech knowledge economy was still decades away, Finland’s inherent disadvantages
gave it a head start in building an education system for the
twenty-­first century.
At the time, however, there were huge problems to overcome. Finnish society was riven by stark inequalities, including
inequalities in education even more severe than those found in
America today. All Finnish children were forced into two possible tracks of middle school—­the common “folk schools” or one
of the more academically oriented private “grammar schools.”
The grammar schools functioned more or less in the way high
schools do now. They were also a prerequisite for a university
education. However, the grammar schools charged tuition, and
often didn’t exist in small towns. The upshot was that only children of well-­off families living in larger towns or more urban
districts could even hope to go to college.
My own grandmother was one of the casualties of this
system. She’d grown up in a small farming community, and
possessed an exceptional intellect. Her teachers at the public elementary school had recommended she continue her studies at
an academic grammar school. That, in turn, could have led her
all the way to a university education. But her mother, a single
parent, couldn’t afford the grammar-­school tuition. Despite my
grandmother’s talents, she was entirely dependent on her family
to fund her education, which came to an abrupt end. She quit
school after six years. Although she did receive some vocational
training after that, she soon became a homemaker, caring for
my father and his brother, and later for us, her grandchildren.
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By the time my parents went to school, the system had improved somewhat. There were more schools, and the government had started to provide subsidies to the private grammar
schools, requiring in return that they enroll some poor but
bright children tuition-­free. Even so, most young Finns still left
school after just six years of basic education. Only about a quarter made it to a grammar school.
That was not enough to provide educated workers for the
growing ranks of Finland’s knowledge-­based businesses. Finnish companies wanted better-­educated employees to help them
compete internationally, and to foster innovation—­a situation
not unlike that of America today. However, Finns back then
were sharply divided on the best way to reform the education
system—­as Americans are today. Finns debated angrily for two
decades over whether or not Finland should create a unified
public school system. Critics asked whether it was reasonable to
try to educate all students to the high levels that the elite pupils
in grammar schools were achieving. Did society really need
all young ­people to be so well educated, or was that a waste of
scarce resources, particularly when there were other problems
to solve? And was it fair, or even necessary, to expect all young
­people to learn not just Finnish and Finland’s other official language, Swedish, but also a foreign language, as the grammar
schools required?
Finally a special committee published its recommendation:
Finland should create a unified public school system. Reactions
were all over the map. Primary school teachers believed that
every student could learn equally well, while university professors tended to be skeptical. Politicians were divided. One Finnish education expert describes the dire prophesies that were
made at the time: “Some predicted a gloomy future for Finland
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if the new ideas related to common unified public school for all
were approved: declining level of knowledge, waste of existing
national talent, and Finland, as a nation, being left behind in the
international economic race.”
What these pessimists failed to see, however, were the benefits in terms of the Nordic theory of love. High-­quality public
education for all would empower each individual, freeing him
or her to receive a good education regardless of accidents of
birth, family background, and family finances. Children would
no longer be dependent on the vagaries of their parents’ skills
or incomes. Everyone would benefit—­individuals and society
as a whole—­if educational opportunity was universal, and if
achievement was solely a reflection of the merits of each individual’s own work and talents. Ensuring a high-­quality education
not just for a few, but for all, would be crucial to building a society composed of independent, self-­sufficient human beings, and
a society of independent, self-­sufficient human beings would
be one in which ­people were less likely to develop unhealthy
dependencies on one another—­and, it should be noted, on the
state. Finland would reap the benefits in dynamism, economic
growth, and human capital, while ­people’s lives would improve
and become more satisfying, as every individual reached his or
her full potential.
The advocates for universal high-­quality education won
the day, and the first and most basic phase of Finnish school
reform was finally implemented in the early 1970s. The initial
goal was slowly and carefully to combine the two parallel tracks
of folk schools and grammar schools into a single comprehensive system. This approach, it was hoped, would bring the more
academically rigorous program to all students. By the end of the
1970s, every municipality in the country had implemented the
new system.
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But once the new framework was in place, Finland had to
make an even more critical commitment to its children. And
that’s when things got really interesting.
W H E R E E XC E L L E N C E C O M E S F R O M
Pasi Sahlberg is a lean, sandy-­haired fifty-­something who wears
stylish, snugly tailored suits. He looks like he could be an engineer in the high-­tech corporate sector. Sahlberg is actually one
of the leading Finnish authorities on education reform. He is
a teacher, scholar, and former director of the Center for International Mobility in Finland’s Ministry of Education. In recent
years he’s been a visiting professor at the Harvard Graduate
School of Education. Before he moved to Cambridge, part of
Sahlberg’s job back in Helsinki was to host the delegations of
educators coming from all corners of the globe to learn from
the Finnish education miracle. In addition, Sahlberg himself
has traveled around the world giving presentations on Finland’s
approach to education.
Back in December 2011, Sahlberg made just such a trip to
a private prep school in New York City. As he sat in an Upper
West Side classroom at the Dwight School, directly across from
Central Park, surrounded by students, teachers, and visitors,
America’s fascination with Finnish education was on full display. Sahlberg chatted with the students about differences in the
American and Finnish education systems. How prestigious was
teaching as a profession? What were schooldays like in the two
countries? How did the SAT compare with the Finnish national
matriculation exam? Yet one of the most remarkable things that
Sahlberg said passed practically unnoticed. “And,” he mentioned
at one point, “there are no private schools in Finland.”
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It is hard to exaggerate the significance of what Sahlberg
had just said. Technically, a small number of independent
schools do exist in Finland. Some are Waldorf schools, which
follow a free-­spirited educational philosophy emphasizing creativity and the arts, first developed in Germany. Some teach in
a language other than Finnish or Swedish, and others are religious. However, all of them must be licensed, and just about all
of them are required to follow Finland’s national core curriculum. Most important, though, just about all these independent
schools must also still be publicly financed through taxes. Only
a few are allowed to charge a small tuition of a few hundred
dollars. As a consequence these independent schools cannot be
compared to American private schools, which create their own
curriculum and fund their operations through tuition. There
are some private vocational schools in Finland and there are a
few international colleges offering foreign degrees, but there
are no private universities offering Finnish degrees. The implications of all this are profound. Even though other choices are
available, practically every person in Finland still attends public
school, whether for pre-­K or a PhD.
How is this possible? In a way the answer is simple: Finland
has enshrined the right to a high-­quality, free education for all
citizens in the Finnish constitution, and has held itself to that
commitment as a society. Just as with good parental leaves and
affordable day care, the Nordic theory of love has led Finland as
a nation to decide that universal access to good schools is also essential to guaranteeing the fundamental human rights of a child
growing up in the modern age. The lottery of whether or not a
child is born into the sort of family wealth necessary to fund a
private education should have nothing to do with it. As a result
Finnish parents don’t spend their time looking into private op-
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tions or figuring out how to pay for them, nor is there a need for
families to spend extra money on a house in a particularly good
public school district.
The son of two teachers, Sahlberg literally grew up in a
Finnish school. He taught mathematics and physics in a junior
high school in Helsinki, worked his way through a variety of
positions in the Finnish Ministry of Education, and spent years
as an education expert at the OECD, the World Bank, and other
international organizations. Partly in an attempt to answer the
questions he always gets asked, in 2011 he published a book
called Finnish Lessons: What Can the World Learn from Educational Change in Finland?
From Sahlberg’s point of view, American school reformers
have been consistently obsessed with certain questions: How
can you keep track of students’ performance if you don’t test
them constantly? How can you improve teaching if you have
no accountability for bad teachers or merit pay for good ones?
How do you foster competition and engage the private sector?
How do you provide school choice?
Most of this misses the point, Sahlberg believes. After his
visit to the Dwight School, during a lecture at Columbia Teachers College later that day, he acknowledged that in the United
States parental choice in education means offering charter
schools and private schools as an option for parents. ­“People believe that a school has to be like a shop, where parents can come
if they want to, or they can go to another shop and buy whatever
they want for their children,” Sahlberg said. But what if all the
schools in the United States were clearly excellent, as they pretty
much are in Finland?
Herein lay the real surprise. As Sahlberg continued, his core
message emerged, whether anyone in his American audience
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heard it or not. Decades ago, when the Finnish school system
was badly in need of reform, the goal of the approach to education that Finland instituted, resulting in so much excellence
today, was not actually excellence.
Instead the goal—­a goal that makes perfect sense in terms of
the Nordic theory of love—­was equity.
To help explain what Finland did more than four decades ago,
it’s useful to jump ahead for a moment to consider some recent
research on education. A few years ago two MIT economics
professors, Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo, published a
book called Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to
Fight Global Poverty. In the book they sort through various solutions that are commonly recommended to solve the problems of
poor countries in areas such as nutrition, health care, finance,
and education. Education, in particular, is often seen as a miracle cure that can solve all of a country’s problems.
Banerjee and Duflo discovered that experts who are tasked
with solving a country’s problems basically tend to think about
education in one of two ways. The first, the “demand” approach,
sees education as an investment like any other. Parents will pay
for their children to go to school because it’s an investment that
will result in future earnings. Only when the benefits of education are understood to be high enough will parents either pay to
send their children to private schools or, alternatively, demand
that public education be improved. In this way of thinking,
competition is the key to ensuring that parents get the level of
quality of education they want for their children. Change will
be driven by demand, not supply.
This view of education is widely accepted around the world
and is popular in the United States. Even though the United
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States has an extensive network of public schools, mainly run
and financed by the states, one in ten American students attends
private school, and practically all university education is tuition
based. Even public education relies heavily on ser­vices provided
by the private sector, including privately run—­and increasingly
for-­profit—­charter schools and testing programs created by
multinational corporations.
The demand approach is behind the concept of “school
choice,” which usually means promoting further privatization
of education. Often it goes hand in hand with other ideas that
are fundamental to the global school-­reform movement: more
standardized tests to measure the effectiveness of teachers; more
teacher accountability for the results of those tests; more competition between schools, teachers, and students; and more hours
of study.
Some of these ideas have been embraced by one Nordic
country, Sweden, which has opened its school system to private
entrepreneurs. Britain has embraced standardized tests. India
is experimenting with school vouchers that can be used in private schools. In the United States both Barack Obama and Mitt
Romney embraced school choice in the 2012 American presidential campaign. Romney in particular showed unwavering
faith that schools will improve only when parents have the opportunity to choose from a variety of options: public, charter,
and private schools. The government’s job, the thinking goes, is
simply to enable this process of natural selection by giving parents vouchers to help pay for any school they’d like.
There is, however, a quirk to education that makes approaching it as a normal investment tricky, as the MIT
­professors Banerjee and Duflo point out. Here’s the problem:
Parents are expected to pay the price of investing in education,
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but children are the ones who reap the benefits—­and usually
that happens only many years or even decades later. This creates a major disconnect between the incentive and the reward,
a disconnect that is seldom acknowledged. In a traditional or
agrarian society, many parents would choose not to make this
investment because there’s no immediate payoff, compared with
keeping the child at home or on the farm to help out. But even
parents in a modern society can be stymied by this disconnect,
especially when education is very expensive. What’s more, the
demand approach requires that parents actively manage their
children’s education. Navigating a confusing variety of educational options, tackling a competitive application process, and
ensuring that your child gets into the right school requires not
only money but also skills, time, and very often connections.
The demand approach makes the child’s destiny almost utterly
dependent on the desires and capabilities of his or her parents.
This is the exact opposite of what a society informed by the
Nordic theory of love would hope to achieve. (I’ll return to the
matter of Sweden shortly.)
What about the second approach to thinking about education that Banerjee and Duflo identify? Their name for it may
not come as a surprise, but the content might. In what they call
the “supply” approach, education is not seen as something that
comes into play only when parents demand it; rather education
is seen as a basic human right. This goal stands regardless of
what individual parents would choose for their child, or what
a family’s particular circumstances would allow them to afford.
Banerjee and Duflo summarize this view as follows: “A civilized society cannot allow a child’s right to a normal childhood
and a decent education to be held hostage to a parent’s whims
or greed. . . . This rationale explains why most rich countries
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simply give parents no choice: Children have to be sent to school
until a certain age, unless parents can prove they are educating
them at home.”
At the end of the 1970s, when education administrators in
Finland were ready to lay out the goals and methods of their
new unified school system, it was indeed this supply approach
to education that seemed to best reflect not just the Nordic
theory of love, but also the realities of the fast-­changing modern
world. The supply approach seemed the best way to achieve
Finland’s goals for a strong knowledge economy, and to ensure
Finland’s success as the twenty-­first century approached. Finland’s administrators committed Finland completely to the
principles of the “supply” approach, and the country has never
looked back.
In short, Finland has achieved its spectacular success with
an approach that is, in just about every way, the diametric opposite of the approaches to education reform that are trending in
America today. It will hardly come as a surprise that such very
different approaches also have very different consequences.
It’s an unfortunate fact that the United States remains astonishingly backward compared to almost all other advanced Western countries when it comes to education, because in America,
what predicts how well a child will do in school is not a child’s
aptitude or hard work, but the status of the child’s parents—­
which is to say, their own levels of education and wealth. Other
countries suffer from this condition too, but the United States
is especially anachronistic. And it’s getting worse: The influence of this wealth predictor in the United States today has only
been growing stronger in recent years. A Stanford professor
found that in 2010, the gap in test scores between rich and poor
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s­ tudents in the United States was about 40 percent larger than
it had been three decades earlier.
Other statistics related to this fact are equally jarring. Take
child poverty. A UNICEF report in 2013 looked at child poverty
in twenty-­nine developed countries. For this report UNICEF
used a common technique that measures income inequality
across societies with differing levels of wealth: A child is deemed
poor if the disposable income of the child’s household is less than
half of the country’s median. The results of the UNICEF study
put Finland’s child poverty rate at less than 5 percent, the lowest
of all rich countries. By contrast, the child poverty rate in the
United States comes close to a shocking 25 percent—nearly a
quarter of the entire population of children. Out of all the countries that UNICEF surveyed, the United States was actually
next to last. Only Romania fared worse.
One might argue that this rate is not significant since it is
relative. In absolute numbers poor American children are surely
better off than poor children in many poorer countries. However,
the comparative poverty rate shows that in the United States, a
much larger percentage of children than in other advanced nations lack access to the basic opportunities, activities, and material
comforts that are considered normal by most p­ eople in society.
You don’t have to be dirt-­poor, or living in Third World conditions, to fall drastically behind in American society.
These two American trends—­
(1) poor children in the
United States fare worse in school than wealthy ones, and (2)
the United States has more poor children than all other rich
countries—­together make crystal clear that America lags far
behind other advanced nations, and faces a fundamental challenge in trying to improve the performance of its students as a
whole.
Ironically the poverty rate itself has become a much-­wielded
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weapon in the American education debate. One camp uses
America’s high child-­poverty rate to defend America’s public
schools: It is not the schools that are the problem, but the circumstances of the students. The argument goes like this: If Finland
had as many poor students as America does, it surely wouldn’t
be able to achieve such good results. In order to fix its schools,
America must fix poverty, these critics say. The second camp
thinks that poverty rates are just an excuse. There is no reason
why a poor child should be less able to learn than a wealthy one,
provided that the child and his or her teachers are held to a high
standard. The United States has a long tradition of poor immigrant children excelling in school and becoming, eventually,
better educated and wealthier than their parents, proving that
a student from modest means can make it as long as they work
hard. The conclusion here is that in order to fix poverty, one
must first fix the schools.
Both camps are right in some ways. Studies have shown
that child poverty is associated with a long list of risks, many
of them related to education: problems with learning, behavior,
health, teenage pregnancy, and drug and alcohol abuse. Clearly
income inequality in the United States does make it harder for
the education system as a whole to compete with the education
systems in more equal societies like Finland. However, income
inequality doesn’t always or automatically mean that there will
be big differences in learning. Many countries, such as Israel and
Mexico, have greater income inequality than the United States,
but show less variety in learning between students of different
backgrounds. Even Finland has income inequality. While it’s
moderate compared with the United States, income inequality has grown considerably in Finland over the past few decades. Yet there’s been relatively little impact on the educational
performance of Finnish students.
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Either way, however, American education reformers of all
camps often tend to dismiss the example of Finland as having
little to offer America, because Finland is such an equal society by comparison. This argument entirely misses the point of
Finland’s success. Overcoming the effects of poverty was precisely what Finland’s education system was built to do, and it
has succeeded in doing exactly that. All those decades ago, when
Finland committed itself to its supply approach to education, it
was doing so to help Finland progress beyond the kind of old-­
fashioned disparities that still so badly plague America today.
What Finland has clearly shown is that creating excellence by
focusing on equity is not only possible, but a highly effective
strategy in equipping a nation for the future.
That said, some of the things that Finland has done to
achieve this success can still come as a surprise. For starters,
Nordics tend to be firm believers in not educating their children
much at all—­at least at first.
F R E E -­R A N G E K I D S
While living in the United States, I got to know a Finnish
­couple named Ville and Nina. They both worked for big companies in New York, and they lived in a beautiful old house in
Westchester, a wealthy county north of New York City with
good schools. Their two sons, Sisu and Kosmo, both born in
the United States, attended a small private day-­care program
housed in a homelike setting nearby that cost about $1,300 per
month per child. At day care, Sisu, the older child, had already
mastered the alphabet and numbers by the age of two. Ville was
impressed by Sisu’s new skills, and he felt inspired to read extra
books to Sisu at home to further advance his progress. Nina,
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however, felt more conflicted. “I remember thinking at that
point, Please stop, don’t teach him. My two-­year-­old doesn’t
need to know all this yet.”
If Nina’s reaction to Sisu’s early learning sounds strange, it’s
not—­not in Nordic countries. A few years after Ville and Nina
and their kids had moved back to Finland, I spoke with them
in their home near Helsinki. By then their younger son, Kosmo,
was three and a half and attending a good English-­language day
care in a nice suburb. He still hadn’t been taught letters and
numbers.
My Finnish friend Laura provides another example. When
she spent a year outside Finland, at Oxford, with her family, she
was astonished to discover that her four-­year-­old son’s British
play school kept a dossier on her son’s learning goals, so they
could report what he’d mastered each month. Laura, taken
aback, told the play-­school staff she’d be happy simply if her
son was happy, and if he learned a little English and made some
friends. Now it was the British play-­school staff’s turn to be surprised. They asked Laura how she could be so relaxed about
education, considering that she was from Finland, the land of
superlearners.
My Danish friend Hannah, a psychologist, found herself
firmly opposed to a new fad in Danish day-­care centers: measurements of children’s progress. Even if the centers were only
measuring whether a child could color inside the lines, Hannah
told me she’d prefer that the staff just leave her children alone
to play by themselves, discovering and expressing their inclinations and creativity.
Are these Nordic parents crazy?
If there is one belief shared by most education experts around
the world today, it is that the first years of a child’s life are crucial
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to later success. But on the question of how best to secure a foundation for a child’s future success, views differ drastically. In the
United States, public education—­that is, compulsory, universal,
and free education—­usually begins at age five, with one year
of kindergarten. However, ever since research suggested that
early-­childhood education offers clear benefits, especially to disadvantaged children, Americans have concluded that children
should start school sooner. One of President Obama’s most-­
talked-­about policy proposals was to extend publicly funded
preschool to all four-­year-­olds. In 2014, the newly elected mayor
of New York City, Bill de Blasio, did exactly that for the children in his city.
­People in Nordic countries, too, certainly consider early
childhood crucial to a child’s later success. In Denmark and
Sweden, virtually all three-­to five-­year-­olds attend day care,
with the other Nordic nations following close behind. In Finland, three-­quarters of children in that age range attend publicly funded day care. But in the Nordic countries there is a
very clear distinction between day care and school. Education
proper does not begin until children are six or seven years old.
In Finland most children have begun with one year of voluntary kindergarten when they’re six; at the beginning of 2015 this
one-­year kindergarten was made compulsory. But actual school
starts late by American standards: not until children turn seven.
If you ask Finns, their day-­care centers for younger children are
not schools at all, and are not meant to be. In fact until a few
years ago, Finland’s public day-­care system fell not under the
jurisdiction of the Ministry of Education but under the Ministry
of Social Affairs and Health.
So why are Nordic parents so seemingly delinquent when
it comes to giving their toddlers a head start? The answer is
disarmingly simple: Childhood should be childhood. Finnish
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day-­care centers have no specific goals when it comes to teaching the alphabet, or numbers, or vocabulary. Instead they follow
each individual child’s interests and create a foundation for later
independent learning by supporting children’s social skills and
curiosity. Mostly this is done according to a well-­known Finnish proverb: “A child’s job is to play.” A typical daily program
in a Finnish day-­care center involves not just recess but several
hours of outdoor play throughout the day—­no matter what the
weather—­along with quiet time, games, napping, and crafts.
Field trips are taken to forests, sports centers, theaters, and zoos,
and activities might include swimming or baking. All Nordics
are great believers in the benefits of fresh air and exercise, starting with putting babies outside to nap in their prams, even in
winter—­of course, they are bundled warmly. Danes and Norwegians have day-­care centers called “forest kindergartens,”
where children spend their entire days almost completely outdoors in nature—­even in cities like Copenhagen, where a bus
might pick the kids up in the morning and bring them back in
the afternoon—­and other day-­care programs might take three-­
year-­olds out for a nice long hike.
In Finland day-­care staff typically read books aloud, and
children learn to sit still and complete small tasks—­eating hot
meals together, helping each other pour milk, or clearing their
dishes. If the children are playing shop, the staff might help
them use numbers in their transactions, or offer other bits of
knowledge to enrich other games, and some children may pick
up some reading skills. But no child is expected to learn to read
before first grade.
Finnish day-­care staff members meet with parents once
or twice a year, but the conversation usually revolves around
things like toilet training and cooperation with other kids, or
the need for unified rules at home and at day care when dealing
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with tantrums. Finns’ most persistent concerns about the quality of day care have little to do with educational achievement.
Instead the questions that tend to consume Finnish parents are:
Can families secure a spot at the day care closest to their home?
Are the play-­group sizes too big? Are the meals and hygiene
top-­notch, or just pretty good? Are the children allowed to nap
too long? (Parents don’t want kids to be so well rested they
won’t fall asleep at bedtime.) Does the staff have old-­fashioned
ideas about gender roles, or are they more progressive? When
it comes to questions regarding academic learning in day care,
Nordic parents tend to be adamant: Less is more.
Compared to child care in many other countries, Finnish day-­care centers are remarkably consistent in quality and
spirit—­there are no confusing and expensive options for Finnish parents to navigate. The centers also tend to have universally excellent facilities with well-­equipped playgrounds. Such
reliability and consistency aren’t just quirks of Nordic culture.
As with family policies, they result from a clear policy commitment in Nordic countries, at the national level, to equity at an
early age for all children. A UNICEF report has commended
Finland in particular for spending considerably more than the
OECD average on early-­childhood care, and for setting the
highest standards of staff-­to-­child ratios of any advanced economy: one adult for every four children under three years old,
and one adult for seven children over the age of three. (Because
of long parental leaves, Nordic day-­care centers usually accept
only children older than six or even nine months.) Staff members must have at least a bachelor’s degree in early-­childhood
education, or a specialized degree in social work or nursing.
Finnish children may just be playing, but even then, Finland’s
national day-­care policies ensure that their caretakers are skilled
professionals who know what they’re doing—­and who keep
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an eye out for any signs of issues that might hinder a child’s
learning further down the road. When children do get to kindergarten, the UNICEF report also notes that Finland has set
stringent minimum qualification requirements for kindergarten teachers, most of whom have a bachelor’s or master’s degree
in education.
By comparison the realities that worry American parents
at typical day-­care centers can be quite different, as I was reminded when I heard Sam Kass, who at the time was the White
House’s senior policy adviser for nutrition policy, explain that
First Lady Michelle Obama’s fight against childhood obesity
often involved simply trying to persuade day-­care staff to take
the children outdoors—­instead of planting them in front of a
television all day. At the opposite extreme, my American acquaintances who have children in academically competitive
preschool programs worry about their children being forced to
sit still and study too much at too early an age. In Nordic thinking, letting children play, letting them get creative in solving the
problem of their own boredom, is a head start on future learning that potentially goes much deeper than memorization and
early technical mastery.
But there is another big piece of the puzzle that allows Finnish children the luxury of a true childhood. Unlike American
parents, Finns don’t have to start worrying about their child’s
future educational path the moment the child is born. As Pasi
Sahlberg puts it, “school readiness” doesn’t mean that families
and their children have to get themselves ready to succeed in
school. It means that schools have to get themselves ready to
receive children, and that schools are there to help every child
make it. And ready they are.
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G R OW I N G G O O D T E AC H E R S
Some time ago I watched a movie called Blue Is the Warmest
Color. It’s one of those French films about young women and
sexual discovery that have something of a history of shocking
American audiences. Having grown up in a Nordic culture,
where nudity and sexuality are treated in a more blasé manner,
I wasn’t particularly focused on the movie’s much-­discussed sex
scenes. Instead it was a moment around a dinner table that lingered with me. In the scene the protagonist, Adèle, is dating a
new girlfriend named Emma, and meets Emma’s mother and
stepfather for the first time. Whereas Adèle’s family is working
class and conservative, Emma’s family is artsy and upper class.
Over oysters and white wine, Emma’s parents ask Adèle what
she wants to do in life. “I’d like to be a teacher,” Adèle responds.
“Ah, yes,” says the mother, clearly not impressed. “Why would
you like to do that?” Adèle explains that school has taught her
many things she wouldn’t have learned from her parents or
friends, and she wants to pass that on to other children. Emma
jumps into the conversation, suggesting that perhaps Adèle will
change her mind once she starts studying. Emma’s stepfather
strikes a conciliatory note: “At least you know where you are
going.”
The scene stayed with me because it illustrated so well what
I had discovered was an enormous difference between Finland
and many other countries: respect for teachers. It was hard for
me to imagine a similar scene in a Finnish film; it would make
no sense that an educated family would look down on a career
in teaching.
Many American school reformers are convinced that the
biggest problem of public education in the United States today
is bad teachers, and that the reason for it lies with the teach-
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ers’ unions. One common complaint is that the unions prevent
schools from firing bad teachers. The documentary Waiting for
“Superman,” a deeply touching film about the plight of poor
American children in bad public schools, was widely watched
and praised, and laid the blame at the door of the teachers’
unions.
From a Finnish point of view, however, if you are worried
about not being able to fire a bad teacher, the solution would be
not to hire a bad teacher in the first place. The key to the debate
over teacher quality—­and respect for teachers—­is actually a
different, larger question. How should we be thinking about the
profession of teaching? Is being a teacher like being a registered
nurse, in which case an associate or bachelor’s degree with some
specialization is usually sufficient preparation? Or is it rather
like being a journalist, in which case a college degree, a certain
kind of attitude, some street smarts, and on-­the-­job learning
are often enough? Or is being a schoolteacher in fact more like
being a lawyer or even a doctor, requiring a significantly higher
level of formal, postgraduate professional training?
In Finland teaching is not considered to be an innate talent
or an easily learned skill, any more than being a doctor is. One
of the most important policies introduced by Finland’s school
reforms was the requirement that all teachers from elementary
through high school have a master’s degree. Today teacher-­
training programs are among the most selective university
majors in the country.
What does it take to become a teacher in Finland? The first
thing to note is that in Finland, as in much of Europe, university systems are generally structured so that greater specialization occurs earlier in a student’s career. An approximate analogy
might be the way an American college student who wants to
attend medical school might start specializing in premed courses
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as an undergraduate. In Finland students who are planning to
become teachers must begin specializing in education from their
first year of college onward. Even those who want to teach primary school must complete an undergraduate major in education, along with minors in the subjects included in the primary
school curriculum. After that, prospective teachers must complete advanced studies that in the United States would be the
equivalent of graduate-­level training to earn a master’s degree.
Candidates for upper-­grade teaching, meanwhile, must major
in the subject they will be teaching, such as math or history, but
they are also required to study education either in an integrated
five-­year program, or in a concentrated fifth year. Each candidate for a master’s degree in education is expected to work some
seven hundred hours preparing and teaching classes in a real
school in front of real students under the supervision of a more
experienced teacher, a system similar to university teaching hospitals. That amounts to about six months of six-­hour school days,
or almost 10 percent of the whole degree. Only eight universities
offer these degrees, and the course work is similar in all schools.
In the United States teacher-­certification systems vary from
state to state. My home state of New York is one of the few states
that do require public school teachers to eventually get a master’s degree. In Texas, by contrast, a person with a bachelor’s
degree can become certified as a teacher through training that
lasts only three months. Most states have introduced similar alternative routes to fast-­track new teachers into the profession,
creating a chaotic patchwork of certifications and training programs of different lengths and orientations. Several studies have
found that even most of America’s university-­based education
schools have low graduation requirements and fail to prepare
teachers for the realities of the classroom.
The American idea that anybody smart and motivated
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enough can be a teacher, without specialized and rigorous training, is reflected perhaps most clearly in the celebrated program
Teach for America. Recent college graduates are put into teaching jobs without previous teaching experience or significant
education course work. There is an appealing idealism to the
program, but critics have increasingly been questioning the results. In the past it perhaps could have been said that teaching
wasn’t rocket science, but in the high-­tech knowledge economies of today, it can actually come pretty close.
On the other hand, is there a danger in setting too high a bar
for those who want to teach? The requirements in Finland may
sound burdensome. And surely Finnish teachers who survive
all that training must then demand higher salaries in return.
In fact, compared with other professionals in Finland who
hold bachelor’s or master’s degrees, teachers’ salaries are average, and considerably below those of lawyers and doctors. That
said, in the United States teachers tend to earn clearly less than
even the typical college graduate. As for Finland’s exhaustive
training requirements, the result has not been fewer candidates
entering the field. Once ambitious young p­ eople discovered that
teaching was a career path that could earn them admiration and
respect, education programs had no trouble recruiting the best
and the brightest.
But even if American attitudes changed, wouldn’t draconian new standards for teacher training, and paying for all that
training up front as Finland has done, amount to overreach for
a taxpayer-­funded education system? Not necessarily. Judging
from Finland’s experience, it is exactly that approach that solves
many of the thorniest problems currently vexing education reformers, especially those in the United States today. The data are
pretty clear: The countries that perform best in the global PISA
survey are those that tend to invest the most in their teachers.
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This simple prescription goes a long way toward fulfilling
the goal of the Nordic theory of love: that individuals get the
high-­quality instruction they need to shape their own destiny,
regardless of their family’s fortunes or actions. In addition, once
you’ve invested in training your teachers well, you can give
schools tremendous freedom. Instead of micromanaging teachers, and monitoring them with ever m
­ ore­invasive methods,
which is what many approaches to reform in the United States
have tried to do, you can more or less sit back and let teachers
do their job.
Finnish schools have no standardized tests. To Americans pushing school reform, this simple fact can seem shocking. Everyone from Barack Obama to Mitt Romney has assumed that
standardized tests are required to ensure quality schools and
quality teaching. In order to receive federal funds for their
public schools, all American states are required to administer
standardized tests in math and English, beginning in the third
grade. Science tests are also given from time to time, and individual states may add other tests of their own to the battery.
America’s standardized tests seem particularly weird from a
Finnish perspective. These tests have not been primarily used to
evaluate students. Instead, students have been used as fodder for
evaluating schools, school districts, and teachers. In New York
City, public school officials published the performance rankings of—­not the students who took the tests—­but the eighteen
thousand teachers who taught them. The reports, which named
individual teachers as well as their schools, ranked teachers
based on their students’ gains on the state standardized math
and English exams over five years. Every student, parent, colleague, friend, neighbor, or random stranger was able to access
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the teachers’ scores online. Schools have been shut down and
teachers fired when their students haven’t shown improvement
on the tests.
When Finland’s school reforms began in the early 1970s, the
government dictated a strict national curriculum, monitored
all textbooks, and even dispatched inspectors to ensure that
schools and teachers were complying with the program—­in
effect using similar methods to what Americans are introducing now. Gradually, though, as more and more Finnish teachers
went through the new, more rigorous training, the government
relaxed its grip, and the public school system grew increasingly
laissez-­faire.
American critics of the Nordic countries like to rant about
the evils of top-­down regulation and big-­government “socialism,” but the reality is that the Finnish government has actually decentralized education and managed it with a light touch.
Over the past few decades, the Ministry of Education has given
more power to municipalities and to the communities that actually run the schools. While there is a national core curriculum,
it has become much less prescriptive since my days in school.
The government sets overall goals, as well as minimum hours
for instruction in the major subject areas, but the municipalities
and schools decide how to reach those goals, and whether they
want to offer additional instruction in other subjects.
As a result all Finnish teachers from primary through high
school have far more professional discretion and independence
than do their counterparts in American public schools. Finnish
teachers can decide how they will teach, when they will teach
each particular topic, and which textbooks—­if any—­they want
to use. Because of this autonomy it can sometimes be hard to
say what a typical Finnish classroom is like. It depends on the
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school and the teacher. This freedom is not given lightly. It is
a direct consequence of the rigorous training that all teachers
must undergo, which in turn lets parents and the government
alike trust that teachers are up to the job.
The lack of standardized testing doesn’t mean that Finns
are hostile to evaluating students. The goal of the Nordic theory
of love is to empower individuals, and that means holding them
to high standards. Finnish teachers are trained to assess children
in the classroom during daily activities, as well as by using tests
they create themselves. In practice many teachers simply modify
tests that come with the teacher’s manuals that accompany their
chosen textbooks—­which are also generally produced by teachers. And unlike on American standardized multiple-­choice
tests, Finnish students are usually required to provide written
answers at some length. Periodically the Ministry of Education
tracks national progress by testing a few sample groups across a
range of different schools.
There is one exception to Finland’s general rule of no standardized testing. It’s called the National Matriculation Exam.
Compulsory education in Finland goes through the ninth grade,
when students are fifteen or sixteen years old. After that most
students attend another three to four years of voluntary high
school, either at an academic or a vocational institution. Students who attend the academic high schools must, at the conclusion of their studies, pass the National Matriculation Exam in
order to receive their high-­school diplomas, as well as to qualify
for entrance to a university. The exam is renowned in Finland
for its rigor and scope, and I remember well my own efforts to
prepare for this intense, daunting test. Students write essays or
solve equations for hours on end, and not just for a day or even
for several days, but for several weeks, during the biannual test-
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ing period, which occurs at the same time throughout the entire
country.
How, then, does Finland hold its teachers and administrators accountable, if not through standardized testing? The
Finnish education guru Pasi Sahlberg put it this way during
his talk at Teachers College: “In the Finnish language we don’t
have the word accountability. It doesn’t exist,” he said. “In Finland we think that accountability is something that is left when
responsibility has been subtracted.”
For Sahlberg what matters is that in Finland all teachers
and administrators are given prestige, decent pay, and a lot of
responsibility. If a teacher is bad, it is the principal’s responsibility to detect the problem and address it. Firing a tenured teacher
is difficult in Finland, too, and nearly all Finnish teachers are
unionized, but that’s not seen as a terrible problem, since the
preferred solution is to figure out what a particular teacher’s
weakness is and then offer him or her additional training. In extreme cases, if repeated attempts to help the teacher do not succeed, and several warnings are issued, the teacher can be fired.
But it’s telling that such measures are rarely necessary.
When Finnish education authorities have, on occasion, considered the possibility of instituting standardized tests, the aim
has been not to monitor teacher performance but to ensure all
students are graded fairly on their final report cards at the end of
their compulsory education. So far Finns have concluded that the
problems with standardized testing outweigh its benefits. Testing takes away teachers’ independence (one of the reasons p­ eople
are drawn to the profession); standardized tests are expensive—­
American spending on testing is estimated to reach $1.7 billion
per year; and if a school’s funding or teachers’ careers are tied to
the tests, some schools are likely to start fudging their scores.
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Worst of all, standardized tests can misdirect schools away
from what really matters: learning. But what, exactly, should
learning consist of in the twenty-­first century?
The question may sound simple enough: What is the purpose
of education? In practice all societies debate this question, revising their answers on the fly. Should children be educated
to fill the roles that a society most needs at any given time—­
manufacturing, say, or engineering, or software development,
or nursing—­or should they be educated to reach their fullest potential as human beings, whatever that may be? Should
they be taught the arts and creative thinking, or should they be
taught concrete skills and diligence? Should they be taught self-­
esteem or self-­control? Should they be taught math or music?
In the United States now, much of the talk swirls around the
idea that schools are not preparing students for the jobs crucial
to the twenty-­first-­century economy—­high-­tech jobs that tend
to require mathematics and science.
The Finnish education system does embrace math and science; they are subject areas in which Finnish students perform
exceptionally well, and they’ve helped Finland achieve economic success. The company that propelled Finland to a new
level of prosperity in the early 1990s, Nokia, was a high-­tech
engineering behemoth that designed and built mobile phones.
Finland’s economy has long relied on other engineering-­based
industries as well: shipbuilding, elevator manufacturing, pulp
and papermaking, and forestry—­so much so that you often
hear Finns with more artsy inclinations bemoaning Finland
as a “land of engineers.” Recently Finland has taken pride in a
new generation of Finnish start-­ups that have created some of
the world’s most popular mobile games and apps. So you might
think that schools in Finland, like those in the United States,
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have primarily emphasized STEM subjects—­science, technology, engineering, and math—­over the arts. But the reality is
more intriguing.
Finns still see the basic goal of public education as preparing
children not for standardized tests, not for college applications,
and not for specific jobs or industries, but more generally for
life, although a life that takes place in the twenty-­first century.
Schools aim to graduate well-­rounded human beings who are
creative as well as technically skilled. To this end, physical education, arts, and crafts remain crucial elements of the permanent
curriculum, alongside more academic subjects. All students—­
girls and boys—­must even study carpentry, sewing, and cooking.
The contrast with American trends in education couldn’t
be greater. In my neighborhood in Brooklyn in New York City,
for example, storefronts started popping up over recent years
offering after-­school arts programs for children. It’s rare to see
such a thing in Finland, and at first I admired this blossoming
of passion for the arts in the United States. But then I realized
the reason: Local public schools had simply been dropping arts
from the curriculum entirely, as they have been all across the
country.
On the same day back in 2012 when New York City was
busy publishing the scores of its teachers based on students’
standardized tests, the Finnish National Board of Education
was busy, too: with an announcement that it was adding more
lessons in arts, crafts, civics, and Finnish language to the curriculum. One might legitimately ask how necessary it is to
sustain such subjects in a public school system with limited resources in a high-­tech age. This was exactly the question that
the well-­known American news anchor Dan Rather posed to
Linda Darling-­Hammond, a professor of education at Stanford
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University and a frequent visitor to Finland herself, in a documentary about Finnish schools. Darling-­Hammond pointed to
the benefits across the curriculum of teaching arts and crafts:
“These things that we think of as frills are at the core of building an active, able mind that not only can enjoy other ­people
and communicate and have artistic abilities but also can do the
core subjects in more flexible ways.” Darling-­Hammond called
it “building the cognitive muscle.”
To be sure, there are areas where Finnish schools can and
should improve. The world is changing constantly, and schools
must as well. Finnish educators do their best to downplay international comparison tests—­after all, Finns don’t believe in standardized testing—­but Finland’s ranking in the PISA education
survey has started to slip, and this has spurred some urgent conversations about the future.
One of the big questions in the mix is whether competition
is good or bad when it comes to helping kids learn and achieve.
And here, too, Finland may offer some important lessons for
America.
C O M P E T I N G BY C O O P E R AT I N G
I spent three years of my life at the Tiistilä School in the town
of Espoo, from grades seven through nine. The school had a
different name back then, and the lower and upper schools used
to be separate units, but the school’s two low, red-­brick buildings with floor-­to-­ceiling windows framing the cafeterias and
lobbies still look the same. Today the school serves about seven
hundred students from kindergarten through the ninth grade.
One recent fall day, I pulled my old bike from my parents’ shed
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and rode it back to school. Children swinging from monkey
bars, teenagers giggling in hallways—­it all felt so familiar. The
energy, the excitement, and the tribulations of youth were the
same as ever, even though much had changed.
American parents, teachers, administrators, and policymakers debate how much involvement schools should have in
the lives of their students. In Finland the Nordic theory of love
provides some key guiding principles. In addition to providing
a high-­quality education, Finns also believe that their public
schools absolutely need to be actively involved in securing children’s health and safety—­another crucial aspect of establishing
every child as a self-­sufficient individual, independent of the
abilities and means of their parents. This starts with the basics.
Finnish public schools offer all pupils free hot meals, health care,
psychological counseling, and individualized student guidance.
More generally Finnish schools also try to be a place where
young p­ eople feel comfortable. To visitors Finnish schools often
look remarkably relaxed, much as Finnish day-­care centers do.
There are no uniforms or strict codes of conduct, and the youngest students even take their shoes off before entering classrooms.
Most Finnish children attend schools that are small compared
to those in many other countries; nevertheless, more than half
of Finnish children are in schools with more than three hundred students. In grades one through six, the average class size is
twenty students, but class size can sometimes rise above twenty-­
five students, which is a common cause for complaint among
Finnish parents. Schooldays are short, and recesses tend to be
frequent; most teachers send their students out to the yard for
fifteen minutes every forty-­five minutes, rain or shine, and for
a longer period after lunch. And, as American observers often
note with shock, Finnish teachers assign very little homework.
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The law on basic education in Finland specifically states that
after school and homework, students should still be allowed
time for hobbies and rest.
Some of these policies were already in place when I went to
school. But there have been new developments. When I was a
student there more than two decades ago, the Tiistilä’s student
body was economically diverse, but there wasn’t much cultural
or ethnic diversity. Today a third of the students at the school
come from an immigrant background.
In addition most schools today have new “pupil welfare
teams” that typically consist of a teacher, the principal, a doctor
or a nurse, a social worker, a psychologist, and a counselor. The
team will convene to discuss problems, and meet with students
and their parents. If the problems with a particular student persist, it is up to the parents to decide whether their child should
switch to a special school for students with learning differences.
Students in Tiistilä, as in other schools, are also entitled to a
flexible system of in-­school tutoring, consisting of anything from
a few extra hours of support to studying one or more subjects
permanently in smaller groups. About half of Finland’s graduating students have taken advantage of this tutoring system
at some point during their school years, rendering the stigma
associated with extra help almost nonexistent, and making private tutors almost unheard of—­in sharp contrast to the United
States, where private tutoring has become a profitable industry
unto itself, and one that severely exacerbates the gap in educational opportunity between rich and poor. Finland’s approach
also stands in stark contrast to other education superachievers
such as Korea, where exhausted students trudge off after school
to another grueling evening shift at private tutoring centers. Instead most Finnish municipalities offer first-­graders a spot in a
subsidized after-­school club so that they don’t have to be alone
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until their parents get home from work. In the clubs students
can eat, do homework, participate in sports, or just play. None
of this existed when I went to school.
If you ask Finnish teachers how it’s possible that Finland can
excel in international surveys even as its students spend less time
in the classroom than students in almost all other OECD nations, they offer simple explanations. The time in school is used
efficiently. Teachers have the freedom to move their schedules
around to suit their lesson plans. While there are no standardized tests, schools send clear signals to students that schoolwork
is important. The schools almost never cancel classes during the
school year—­there are no American-­style snow days, even this
close to the Arctic circle—­and teachers monitor students’ progress vigilantly, providing help if they start falling behind.
Yet with so much support, it might sound as though Finnish students don’t actually have to work that hard to succeed.
Aren’t they missing out on the positive effects of healthy competition and striving?
In his book Pasi Sahlberg quotes a line from a Finnish writer
named Samuli Paronen: “Real winners do not compete.” It’s
hard to think of a more un-­American idea. In the United States
today, the drive to reform schools is suffused with the language
of competition. When schools and teachers are pitted against
one another, the thinking goes, the best performers will emerge.
Among students, too, competition is seen as bringing out the
best in young p­ eople, spurring them to greater accomplishment,
whether through academic rankings, sports events, or lists of
the prestigious colleges and universities to which they’ve been
accepted. And in many of the countries where students perform
well on the PISA survey, high expectations also mean more
competition.
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When it comes to education, though, Finland’s remarkable
success suggests that the Finnish attitude toward competition—­
which is to say, avoiding it whenever possible—­might have
some serious merits. There are no lists of best schools or teachers in Finland, with the sole exception of rankings, compiled
by the media, of academic high schools, which are based on the
grades they require for admission and the performance of their
students on the National Matriculation Exam at graduation. In
Finland what makes the system work is cooperation. Teachers
build courses, create lesson plans, and even teach classes together, and principals offer one another advice. Lately Finnish
teachers have been discussing the possibility of sharing lesson
plans online for colleagues to use freely.
In what may come as another surprise to Americans, Finnish schools have no sports teams. Physical education is included
in the curriculum, but if students want to compete in sports,
they do so on their own time. An extensive network of sports
organizations, both privately and publicly funded, exist to facilitate youth sports teams. But at school, gym classes are designed
not to teach competition but rather to introduce children to different forms of exercise so that they can build a healthy lifestyle. While living in the United States, I came to appreciate the
way team sports at American schools foster community spirit,
teach teamwork, allow poor kids to participate in expensive
sports, and give students opportunities to shine in fields other
than academics. At the same time I wondered if team sports also
consume too much of education budgets, create unnecessary hierarchies within the student body (the world-­famous jocks and
nerds), lead administrators to give questionable leeway to athletes in their academic work, and overall, distract staff and students alike from the school’s primary mission.
Finnish students compare their grades and compete against
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one another as all humans do, and Finns love competition when
appropriate—­just visit Finland when the Ice Hockey World
Championship is under way! But schools as institutions encourage students to focus on their own work rather than to compete
against one another.
However, that doesn’t mean that the work they are asked to
do is easy.
When a journalist named Amanda Ripley studied the experiences of foreign-­
exchange students—­
both Americans going
abroad, and students coming to America—­for her book The
Smartest Kids in the World, she found that most of them thought
high school was more difficult outside the United States: Math
problems were harder, exams more expansive, and grading more
severe. One of the students Ripley interviewed was a Finnish
teenager, Elina, who spent a year at a high school in Michigan.
Elina describes the astonishment she felt when an American
history teacher gave the class a study guide with the questions
and the answers for an upcoming exam—­something that would
never happen in Finland. Not only that, but many of the students still managed to do poorly on the test. Elina got an A,
which she didn’t particularly take pride in; how could you fail if
you had been given the answers in advance? In Algebra II, the
most advanced math class offered at her American high school,
she got a score of 105 out of 100 on her first test. Until then Elina
had thought it mathematically impossible to score 105 percent
on anything, Ripley notes wryly. In Finland Elina had been a
good student, but not exceptional. American high school felt like
elementary school to her; instead of learning to write long history essays, as she had in Finland, the assignments for her history
class in the United States consisted mostly of making posters.
To be fair, Finnish exchange students usually come from
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a­ cademic high schools, while their less academically inclined
peers have at that point already switched to vocational schools,
thus making comparisons with all-­inclusive American high
schools somewhat unjust. Yet when it comes to the question
of how best to support students and help them perform better,
Ripley’s observations about academic expectations reminded me
of a difference between Nordic and American parenting styles.
Once a Nordic child starts school around the age of six or seven,
parents and teachers start encouraging independence, and helicopter parenting is a rarity. American parents, by contrast, feel
obliged to become hyperinvolved in their children’s academic
and extracurricular lives, helping with homework and arranging tutors, so their kids can get into good schools. This is exactly
the sort of unhealthy dependence that the Nordic theory of love
is intended to avoid.
Tellingly, when Amanda Ripley interviewed Kim, an American teenager studying for a year in Finland, Kim reported that
what she loved most about her experience in Finland was the
independence and autonomy she was given. Kim explained
how Finnish teenagers were expected to manage their own
schedules and workload without parental or teacher oversight,
which she felt was entirely different from the expectations back
at her school in Oklahoma. She was amazed to see eight-­year-­
olds walking home from school alone—­perfectly normal in
Finland—­and ten-­year-­olds hanging out without supervision,
even in the big city of Helsinki. Kim concluded that in Finland
teenagers are treated like adults.
A Swedish acquaintance of mine once described the differences in parenting styles between him and his British wife when
it came to their two school-­age children. “She is much more
prescriptive in what they should do and what they shouldn’t
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do, and what they should wear and not wear, and what they
should study and so on,” he explained. “From her British point
of view, that is caring. She thinks Nordics are uncaring and not
so engaged. From my view it’s, ‘Guys, you have to do this yourself. I’m not going to be around every day. I’m not with you in
school. You have to organize this yourself.’ ”
What a Nordic parent sees as teaching children self-­reliance
can look to others like neglect. And what to others is caring, to
a Nordic is hovering. Nordic parents spend a lot of time telling their children that school is important, and many parents
will quiz their children before tests or ask if their homework
is done. Overall, however, they rely on their children to handle
their schedules and their work much more than Americans do.
In Finland, because schools are there to ensure the independence and self-­sufficiency of students, parents can also trust the
school to help their child if he or she is having trouble. Though
some might criticize Finnish schools for “coddling” kids with
warm food, nurses, lots of recess, short hours, and no standardized tests, in reality Finnish students are expected to learn complicated material, and their disappointments are not washed
away or glossed over with compliments. Teachers are not their
nannies. In Nordic thinking you absolutely give children the
conditions they need to succeed. But then they have to work for
it. And as it turns out, there is some evidence that this might be
exactly the way to go.
Recent research by two American professors suggests that
parents volunteering in school or helping children with homework does not help students do better in school, contrary to what
is generally believed in the United States. “The essential ingredient is for parents to communicate the value of schooling, a
message that parents should be sending early in their children’s
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lives and that needs to be reinforced over time,” write Keith
Robinson, an assistant professor of sociology at the University
of Texas, Austin, and Angel L. Harris, a professor of sociology
and African and African American studies at Duke University.
“But this message does not need to be communicated through
conventional behavior, like attending PTA meetings or checking in with teachers. . . . What should parents do? They should
set the stage and then leave it.”
After all the evidence in favor of Finland’s approach to education, though, a huge question still hangs over it all. In the end,
could the Finnish model truly be applied to a country as diverse
as the United States? Do Finland’s policy choices—­the supply
approach, universal day care, ambitious teacher education, lack
of standardized tests, in-­school tutoring, short schooldays, and
cooperation—­really explain Finland’s success?
Or is the reason for it actually much simpler: That Finns are
all the same?
RICH, HOMOGENEOUS, AND UNIQUE?
Finland is a small, ethnically homogeneous, and rather quiet
place. The United States is a vast and uproarious multitude.
The differences are enormous, so it’s perfectly understandable
that many Americans doubt the relevance of Finland’s experiences in education. The doubters say that Finland—­like any
Nordic country—­is a poor example for the United States, not
only because Finland has less poverty, but also because in Finland everyone is more or less the same. Frederick M. Hess, director of education policy studies at the conservative American
Enterprise Institute, for one, thinks all this “Finlandophilia” is
completely blown out of proportion.
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Yes, Finland and the United States are different. But consider the fact that most American education is managed by the
states. Finland’s population of 5.5 million is easily comparable
to many an American state. In fact, more than half of America’s states—­
thirty of them—­
have populations smaller than
Finland’s. Solely on the question of size, there’s no reason any
number of states in the United States couldn’t implement a
system just like Finland’s. As for diversity, it’s true that Finland
is a relatively homogeneous country—­slightly more than 5 percent of Finnish residents have been born in another country,
compared with 13 percent in the United States, and ethnically,
Finland’s population is far more uniform. But again, as of 2010,
there were nineteen states in the United States that had a smaller
percentage of foreign-­born residents compared with Finland.
Meanwhile, Finland has rapidly been growing more diverse,
with the number of foreign-­born residents doubling during the
decade leading up to 2012. Did the country lose its edge in education as a result? No. What’s more, immigrants have tended to
concentrate in certain areas, so there are some Finnish schools
that are extremely diverse. Have those particular schools lost
their edge? No.
The argument that Finland’s school success is based mostly
on a homogeneous culture, rather than primarily on smart education policies, is also undercut by some rather interesting
evidence within the Nordic region itself. Sadly, not all Nordic
countries are education success stories. In fact, those whose educational policies and school systems are more like America’s are
not doing especially well—­despite the cultural value they put
on education, and despite the same sort of homogeneity Finland has.
An American former schoolteacher and current education
analyst named Samuel Abrams, who has taught for years in
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both private and public schools in New York City, conducted
research as a visiting scholar at Columbia University’s Teachers College on the differences in education policy between
Finland and one of its close neighbors, Norway. Unlike Finland, Norway has taken an approach to education that is more
American than Finnish, using standardized tests and teachers
who have received less rigorous training. The result? Mediocre performance on the PISA survey. Educational policies like
Finland’s, Abrams suggests, are probably more important to the
success of a country’s school system than a nation’s size or ethnic
makeup.
Nevertheless, in recent years even the Nordic countries
have been experimenting with offering citizens more choice
in general, particularly the option to use private providers for
some government-­
funded ser­
vices. Sweden, especially, has
opened its school system to private entrepreneurs and for-­
profit schools. Today 14 percent of Swedish students attend a
privately run school. Proponents of school choice in America
and across the globe have hailed this school voucher system in
Sweden. However, they have often misunderstood or ignored
some of its critical features. Sweden allows parents to choose
any government-­approved school on the government krona,
but Swedes, like all Nordics, are still very much focused on the
equality of ser­vices. Thus Swedish independent schools are allowed to charge only the price that the voucher covers, and they
are required to follow the national curriculum.
In reality, what Sweden’s “free schools,” as they are called,
resemble is American charter schools. And frankly, the results
are questionable. School choice has increased social and ethnic
segregation in Swedish schools, and the country’s PISA results
have fallen more than any other country’s from 2000 to 2012.
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Sweden does have a significant immigrant population—­in 2013,
15 percent of its population was born in another country, which
is actually a higher rate than the United States—­but immigration did not explain Sweden’s declining performance. Finland’s
more direct approach of providing education almost entirely as
a public ser­vice has so far generated much better results. All
of which raises the question: Does money actually buy better
education?
A few years ago I came across a startling headline in Finland’s
biggest newspaper. In the future, the headline declared, Finnish
schools may be funded according to the level of education of
a child’s parents. Had Finland really decided to funnel more
money to schools for children from privileged backgrounds? As
I read the article, I realized that my years of living in the past—­
which is to say, in the United States—­had made me jump to the
wrong conclusion. In America the sad and anachronistic reality is that schools for privileged children are better funded than
other schools. What the Finnish government had announced
was exactly the opposite, a policy that would take Finland
even further into the future. In municipalities where parents
had fewer high-­school diplomas, the schools would get more
funding.
The way schools are funded is one of the most astonishing
differences between the United States, which does not perform
particularly well in global education rankings, and other more
advanced nations that do. Consider Finland: Even though its
schools have a lot of local autonomy when it comes to designing
their syllabi and administration, strict rules are imposed from
the top down that require all municipalities and the central
government to cooperate in funding all the required operations
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for all schools. This means that Finnish schools are funded
through more or less uniform tax rates and by a much broader
swath of society than just the immediate neighborhood, town, or
city where a school is located. Municipalities have some leeway
in how they allocate funding across different schools, but they
can’t go against the Ministry of Education’s requirements for
the minimum hours that must be taught in each subject area.
Cutting an arts program to save money, for example, would be
strictly forbidden.
Indeed, instead of cuts that disadvantage certain students,
Finns favor a much more forward-­looking policy of “positive
discrimination.” The national government allocates extra funds
to municipalities with schools that face particular challenges.
Such challenges could include a higher proportion of students
with learning differences or special needs, more immigrants,
high levels of unemployment in the municipality or a lower
level of education among parents—­the latter being exactly the
subject of that newspaper headline. For sure, wealthy municipalities might be able to offer students more electives, for example, foreign languages, but overall these differences are small.
In the United States, by contrast, the funding that different schools receive is allowed to vary across an enormous range,
resulting in vast disparities in the amounts of money available
to educate different children in different districts, and even
children in different schools within the same district. As many
Americans well know, the biggest problem with how schools
are funded in the United States is the bizarrely old-­fashioned
custom of relying on local property taxes. The most obvious
problem with this is the huge disparities that exist in wealth
based on property ownership. According to one report, “local
property wealth per capita in a given state’s richest school dis-
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trict can be 50 times that of the poorest, or more.” As a result,
schools in wealthy areas tend to be far, far better funded than
schools in poor areas, with nicer buildings, better-­paid teachers,
more course offerings, and newer technology.
A United States federal commission of twenty-­seven education experts chartered by Congress studied equity in education,
and delivered a withering condemnation of America’s system of
funding schools through property taxes, a system that is entirely
unsuited to an advanced country in the twenty-­first century. In
its 2013 report the commission declared that disparities in school
funding are the biggest contributor to inequality in American education today. The commission also pointed to an oft-­overlooked
injustice hidden in the property-­tax system: the wealthy can raise
more money while paying lower tax rates. “Imagine two towns,”
the commission suggested. “Town A has $100,000 in taxable
property per pupil; Town B has $300,000. If Town A votes to tax
its property at 4 percent, it raises $4,000 per pupil. But Town B
can tax itself at 2 percent and raise $6,000 per pupil.”
To a rather amazing degree, the American system of funding education actually achieves exactly the antithesis of the
Nordic approach. Instead of freeing each child from the circumstances of his or her birth, the U.S. system of paying for
education does the opposite: It firmly cements the dependency
of almost every child, first and foremost, on his or her parents’
wealth—­or lack of it. This robs rich and poor students alike of
the chance to develop autonomy and independence as they grow
up, further wasting the talent that America needs to succeed as
a nation. But that’s not all; the American education system is
also terribly inefficient. In 2011, only four other countries in the
world spent more per student than the United States educating
children aged six to fifteen. Most of the world’s s­ uperachievers
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in education are not among the biggest spenders. Because of
smart policies, Finland is able to spend less per student than do
Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and the United States on all levels,
with much better outcomes.
The good news for America, though, is that for precisely
this reason, Finland is an encouraging example for any country
that is facing diminished budgets. When Finnish school reform
began in the 1960s and 1970s, times were tough; in the 1990s,
the country faced a devastating banking crisis and recession.
Public budgets for health care and family benefits were slashed
without mercy. But schools overall survived the cuts and have
remained on course. So how does Finland manage to spend less
than the United States?
One area in which Finns excel is cutting administrative
costs. School principals are teachers to begin with, and they continue to teach while on the job. Above individual schools, management occurs in the municipalities, without the complication
of smaller districts. Above that, municipalities answer directly
to the Ministry of Education. When Dan Rather completed his
documentary about Finland’s approach to education—­the film
was titled Finnish First—­he compared school administration in
Finland with school administration in Los Angeles. Rather reported that the Finnish government oversaw more than a million students, from primary school to university, and did so with
about 600 administrators. In comparison, Rather noted, the city
of Los Angeles oversaw some 664,000 students, and did so with
about 3,700 administrators.
Many of Finland’s other education policies also help save
money, including integrating students with learning differences
or special needs into normal classrooms, avoiding grade repetition,
keeping class sizes relatively large, and skipping standardized tests.
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So is there a beacon of hope for reforming American
education in any of this? Clearly, for anyone truly interested in
advancing equity of opportunity and educational performance
for all American children, public education must be the focus,
and Finland’s example shows that it can be done even without ballooning budgets. Yet how could we possibly get there?
What Finland has accomplished seems so distant from what the
United States could do.
As it happens, there is more than a glimmer of hope. It turns
out that Finns did not invent most of the education policies they
are currently using. Americans did. Child-­centered education,
problem-­solving-­based learning, educating ­people for democratic life—­these are all ideas introduced by American thinkers.
While no country can import an educational system wholesale
from somewhere else, Finland shows that it is certainly possible
to import educational ideas and adapt them to another country.
In fact Finnish educators continue to admire many aspects of the
American education system: the way American schools interact
with their communities; the way American teachers interact
with students as individuals and nurture their self-­confidence;
the ambitious projects that students in many American schools
undertake.
It doesn’t seem, then, like much of a stretch to suggest that
the United States could borrow smart ideas about education
from Finland. On the other hand, it could simply take advantage of the best aspects of America’s own knowledge on education reform—­the ones that Finland has shown to be so effective.
There is also an area of education that I haven’t discussed
yet, and it is one that causes Finns to look longingly to none
other than the United States.
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L E A R N I N G F R O M . . . A M E R I C A?
On more than one occasion I’ve found myself hopelessly jealous as American friends have casually reminisced about their
university years and the world-­renowned economists, scientists, and artists who taught them. I could only dream of such
star power among the faculty at my modest university back in
Finland.
When the British Times Higher Education magazine conducts its prestigious ranking of the world’s best universities on
thirteen indicators that include teaching, research, citations, and
innovation, along with the degree to which the staff, students,
and studies have an international scope, America always comes
out on top. In the 2015–16 ranking six out of the top ten institutions were American, three were British, and one was Swiss.
The first Finnish university came in at a rather dismal 76th
place: the University of Helsinki. Sweden did somewhat better,
with Stockholm’s flagship medical school, the Karolinska Institute, appearing 28th. How is it that Finland could have such
a great basic education system but only mediocre universities?
And conversely, how can the United States struggle so much
with the basics, but dominate the entire world in higher education?
For starters, the PISA survey and university rankings are
measuring totally different things. While PISA looks at the
skills of all fifteen-­year-­olds in a country, university rankings
look at the best universities in each country, not the skills of all
students graduating from all universities. Kevin Carey, the director of education policy programs at the New America Foundation, was getting at this distinction when he pointed out in
an article: “When President Obama has said, ‘We have the best
universities,’ he has not meant: ‘Our universities are, on aver-
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age, the best’—­even though that’s what many ­people hear. He
means, ‘Of the best universities, most are ours.’ ” As Carey goes
on to explain, this distinction obscures some important information: “International university rankings . . . have little to do with
education. Instead, they focus on universities as research institutions, using metrics such as the number of Nobel Prize winners
on staff and journal articles published. A university could stop
enrolling undergraduates with no effect on its score.”
The more appropriate comparison would be a PISA study
for university graduates. In 2013, OECD did publish just such a
survey for the first time, measuring the literacy, numeracy, and
technology skills of adults with and without college education
in different countries by asking them to solve real-­life problems.
Finland was again among the top countries, while Americans—­
even those with a college education—­came in below the OECD
average.
Just as we must ask what the purpose of education is, we
must also ask what the purpose of universities is. Though Finland’s best university, the University of Helsinki, may languish in
rankings, Finland’s population of adults with university degrees
is clearly very well educated. Perhaps the more important question is, What are universities in the United States and Finland
accomplishing? America spends more on higher education per
student than any other OECD country. At the same time America’s top universities, while brilliant, represent an exceedingly
elite concentration of resources, and are hardly accessible to most
ordinary citizens. Moreover, for the tiny number of students and
their families who manage to get through the gates, an American
college education comes with a breathtakingly high bill.
While one might expect college education to become cheaper
and more accessible over time, as it becomes the norm, in the
United States the opposite has happened; tuition costs have
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risen much faster than median family income, and state and
local governments have cut funding to schools. Although there
is always a chance that a child will qualify for grants, loans, or
even scholarships, my American friends start saving for their
child’s college fund as soon as the baby is born, if they can. At
a time when more and more employers are requiring a college
degree, getting one has become less and less affordable for the
average American.
Universities in Finland by contrast continue to implement
society’s assurance of equity of opportunity. All Finnish universities are public and charge no tuition. At Helsinki University
the amount that students have to pay tallies up to an annual
grand charge of about $110. This is simply to cover membership in the students’ association. Meanwhile university students
receive a stipend of about six hundred dollars per month; this
helps them with rent and groceries, and in the process helps
them become established as autonomous adults. Part of the stipend is taxable, and if the student works during a semester and
earns wages over certain amounts, the stipend gradually decreases. Otherwise, though, because the Nordic system is dedicated to the independence of every individual, and discourages
financial dependence on family, there is no means testing for the
stipend.
Imagine, then, what it’s like to be a Nordic parent. You can
simply focus on raising a human being, in an age-­appropriate
way at every stage, without ever once feeling guilty that you’re
not saving enough money, or not making enough money, to
secure them the college education they’ll need to avoid ending
up in the gutter. Rather than micromanage teenagers’ lives, you
can, for the most part, let them take satisfaction in their nascent
adulthood by handling much of the college application process
themselves. How different that is in every way—­psychologically,
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financially, and academically—­from the American college experience.
In America family wealth helps students get ahead in many
ways, and as America relies more and more on anachronistic
ways of arranging its society, that’s only becoming more true.
After the financial crisis, as colleges saw both their endowments
shrinking and public funding diminished, admissions at some
schools shifted to favor students whose families could afford
to pay full price. And as everyone knows, alumni donations
to competitive colleges may help, and certainly can’t hurt, the
chances of one’s own children getting an edge in admissions.
These practices, combined with ever-­increasing tuition and an
ever ­more ­competitive and c­ omplex application process, contribute to a brutally exclusive and deeply entrenched inequality
in American higher education.
I’d be the first to admit that Finland could learn a lot from
the best American universities. My Finnish friends who have
studied in places like Berkeley or Yale marvel at the small class
sizes, world-­famous teachers, and the ambition and energy with
which both the faculty and students conduct their work. Finnish universities can seem slow-­paced and lackluster in comparison. But while Finland certainly should focus on improving its
universities, the United States has a long way to go to improve
the accessibility of higher education, as many American policy
makers have realized. Ultimately, if the goal is to educate a nation’s ­people, nothing is more important than equity of opportunity, and if the goal is to produce creative, confident, flexible,
independent thinkers, nothing is more important than nurturing the autonomy of the individual.
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P E AC E F U L PA R E N T S
Comparing education systems can feel like a fool’s errand.
International studies only testify to whatever it is they are built
to measure, and they cannot express the whole reality of any
education system. As a Finn, I am keenly aware of the irony
that the main claim to fame for Finnish education is an international standardized test, when standardized tests run counter
to Finland’s entire philosophy and approach. Finns themselves
find many faults in their own school system: lack of innovation
and creativity; bullying; class sizes that are too big; conflict and
restlessness in the classroom; inadequate support for both gifted
students and at-­risk youth; and insufficient resources for health,
counseling, and tutoring. To the horror of many Finnish parents, in recent years education administrators have tried to cut
costs by combining small schools into bigger units.
Finnish schools need to keep evolving. The Finnish education expert Pasi Sahlberg is concerned about the lagging performance of teenage boys in Finnish schools, and what he sees
as a lack of vision in Finland for the education system’s future.
He would like to cut the strictly programmed, shared classroom
time in higher grades by half and use the time for independent
study and group projects that would break down the traditional
separation of students by age. He would add more focus on
skills that Finnish schools now mostly ignore: social interaction,
communication, and debate. Finally, and most significantly, he
would make the most important task of a school helping students to find their own passion, and to channel that passion
into learning all subjects better. This would require rethinking
almost everything about the current Finnish model, including
teacher education.
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In Finland, too, some parents have started to send their
children to schools that offer more electives or are considered
otherwise better than the school closest to their home. This can
happen for a variety of reasons: Parents may be afraid that other
students in the school drink and are a bad influence, or that a
significant immigrant population slows everyone’s learning. At
the same time schools have started to create selective tracks, to
which pupils must apply through entrance exams. These are not
gifted tracks the way they are understood in many parts of the
world—­students are not taught an accelerated curriculum in all
subjects. But these special tracks can add extra lessons in music,
dance, or science, for example.
However, taken overall, Finnish parents trust their neighborhood schools. And it’s not just the structure of the basic
education system that creates relatively peaceful parents and
families. It’s also the accessibility of higher education after the
compulsory education system ends. As a society Finland has
set a goal for itself that every graduate of junior high school
will have a spot in a school at the next level waiting for them,
whether academic or vocational, and that all youths under the
age of twenty-­five will be meaningfully occupied in either studies or employment.
And since most Finns do not need to worry about paying
back huge student loans, they can choose a career with a lower
salary without fearing personal bankruptcy. The system Finland has created allows parents like my friend Noora to trust
that their children will do just fine. This affords everyone involved a tremendous amount of autonomy and freedom—­the
key values of the Nordic theory of love.
Finland’s goal of equity has resulted in a system where each
individual student, completely without regard to family back-
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ground or wealth, gets the educational foundation he or she needs
to succeed in today’s global economy. By contrast, in America
the state of education is breathtakingly sad: Educational choice
and competition abound, yet in reality p­ eople’s options are so
limited that the notion of a “land of opportunity”—­what America is supposed to be all about—­is increasingly a fiction. Young
­people grow toward adulthood not with increasing independence but with debilitating dependence, on either the lottery-­
like vagaries of patchy public schools, along with a few charter
schools, or their parents’ ability to pay for private schools, expensive tutors, and fancy colleges. Either way American families are trapped by the inequities of the system, and the path of
the individual is largely predetermined, robbing young p­ eople
of independence and a sense of confidence and agency in the
creation of their own fates. This is bad for rich as well as poor
­people. The levels of anxiety in the United States today about
education are proof enough that instances of social mobility
through education are the rare exception, even without all the
data confirming that this lack of mobility is indeed the unfortunate truth in America.
When I moved to America, my own education was already
complete and I didn’t have children yet. Even so, the realities
of education in the United States intruded into my life and
dreams, contributing to the anxiety I was feeling. When Trevor
and I talked about having kids, we focused on the most immediate worries: parental leave, child care, paying the bills. But if
we let ourselves think further or talked to our friends or relatives who had children, our unease only grew more intense.
We were living in a rental apartment in a nice area with good
schools, but being able to buy a place in a good school district
seemed utterly beyond our means, and with our income, paying
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for private school would be out of the question. Generally, at
this point in our conversation, we concluded that we would just
have to move to Finland if we had children. In fact that’s exactly
the decision that several Finnish American ­couples I know have
made. But how sad is it that one feels the need to leave one of
the wealthiest and most exciting countries in the world simply
because it’s such a hard place for your kids to get a decent education?
I’m sure many Americans in our situation would just quit
whining, pick themselves up by their bootstraps, and start working to make the extra money it takes to provide for a child. But
is it right that children suffer for the choices of their parents,
and that society loses the contributions those children could otherwise make, if only they had a good school? At the national
level, the goal of educational policy in the United States—­as articulated by almost everyone from the president on down—­is to
preserve American competitiveness into the future by investing
in a knowledge-­based economy. Finland’s experience suggests
that to win at that game, a country has to prepare not just some
but all of its population well.
If I could choose, I’d want my child to have the best of both
worlds. From Finland I would take the affordable, relaxed day
care, highly educated teachers, high quality of all neighborhood
schools, and lack of tuition. From the United States I would
take the diversity of student populations and the systematic and
inspiring way that the best American schools encourage students to express their individuality, think for themselves, and
communicate their opinions and skills to others without self-­
consciousness or unnecessary timidity. I keep thinking how different my own life might have been if I’d had access to the best
American drama classes, science projects, or debate clubs.
Is that an impossible goal? Finland’s experience shows that
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it is possible to achieve excellence by focusing not on competition but on cooperation, and not on choice but on equity. The
basic principles and policies that Finland has adopted are not
complicated, and could be implemented almost anywhere. The
principle of creating a level playing field that supports every
individual—­call it the schoolmaster’s version of the Nordic
theory of love—­led Finland to commit to supplying an equally
good education to everyone, free of financial considerations. In
the end it was the commitment to educational equity that resulted in excellence, not the other way around, and this commitment has placed Finland in an admirable position as it faces the
future—­a challenge that America, too, must face.
The United States already possesses all the resources and
knowledge it needs to improve its schools. The best American schools continue to infuse students with traits that p­ eople
in other countries envy: energy, creativity, self-­
confidence,
and entrepreneurial spirit. Combining the best of Finnish and
American approaches would bring the United States into the
twenty-­first century and create an education system truly designed for the future. It would allow America to benefit from
all its talent, and it would free children and their parents both
from worry and unhealthy dependencies. Schools are not the
only places that teach us what we need to know in life, but they
are the beginning. That beginning needs to be open to all.
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FIVE
HEALTHY BODY,
HEALTHY MIND
H OW U N I V E R S A L H E A LT H C A R E
C O U L D S E T YO U F R E E
W E LC O M E TO B U R K I N A FA S O
It was a sunny Saturday in late April in New York City. The
weather was unusually warm, and Trevor and I were planning
to head out to the park to enjoy the first taste of summer after
a cold winter. But first I sat down and went through the day’s
mail. An official-­looking envelope had arrived for me from
Finland. Perhaps it should have worried me, but it didn’t.
By then I’d been living in the United States for just under
four months. Trevor and I weren’t yet engaged, so I didn’t
know that I would eventually become a permanent resident of
the United States. I was still paying taxes to Finland, and I was
still enrolled in Finland’s national health-­insurance program. In
addition I’d taken out a reasonably priced Finnish travel insurance plan to cover me for any emergencies in the United States.
It seemed like a good situation for the time being.
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When I tore open the envelope from Finland, everything
changed. The letter inside, from a Finnish government agency,
informed me that because I was now residing outside Finland,
my benefits as a Finnish citizen were being suspended. As
I stared at the letter, a tight knot formed in my stomach. My
new life in America had already been taking its toll on me in
anxiety, but the causes for my unease hadn’t been entirely clear,
even to me. Now I had a reason to worry that was crystal clear.
My access to Finland’s national health program had been cut
off, and in the same moment, the supplementary travel plan I’d
purchased had been invalidated, too. Essentially I had just lost
my health insurance.
Relax, Americans would tell me. When I mentioned my new
lack of health coverage to American acquaintances, several
explained that they themselves had lived without health insurance for years—­some because they couldn’t afford it, but others
just because they didn’t think it was necessary. “You just have
to go to your local free clinic,” they advised me, and “you’ll be
taken care of.”
Needless to say, that wasn’t really the way it was supposed
to work. P
­ eople in the United States who do not have health
insurance are supposed to pay for all of their treatment themselves: doctors, ambulances, hospitals, drugs, tests. Charity
clinics might help, but they are no substitute for having health
insurance. As a result, what tends to happen in practice is that
Americans who lack insurance forgo some of the most impor­
tant medical visits a person can make, like screenings for diseases such as breast cancer or prostate cancer. When sick, they
also tend to put off going to the doctor unless they experience
unbearable pain, at which point the illness may have progressed
so far that they’re already in serious trouble and require far
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more invasive and expensive treatment. I certainly didn’t want
to end up in that situation myself.
I started to harbor serious fears about ending up deeply
in debt if I went to a doctor without insurance. Sitting at my
kitchen table in Brooklyn reading the newspaper some mornings, I’d run across stories like the one about an uninsured young
woman about my age who’d experienced sudden digestive discomfort, ended up in the hospital for a ­couple of days, and been
stuck with a bill of over seventeen thousand dollars. I heard stories of ­people who elected to have a painful tooth yanked out,
instead of getting it treated, because simply removing it was
cheaper. Millions of uninsured Americans don’t even take their
prescribed medicines, or take only part of the prescribed dose,
or self-­medicate with random leftover drugs they get from their
friends, all in order to save money.
Yet many Americans, including politicians who should
know better, continue to repeat the reassuring mantra that no
American dies for lack of health insurance. It turns out that
even this isn’t true. Victims of car accidents who lacked health
insurance, for example, received less treatment and were significantly more likely to die of their injuries than victims who
had health insurance, even when they were taken to emergency rooms, according to one study I read. Other studies estimated that uninsured adults in the United States had a 25 or
even 40 percent higher risk of death than insured adults, even
after adjusting for various factors such as age, smoking, and
obesity.
In addition, one had to ask how many Americans were regularly risking death because they knew that seeking treatment was
likely to be financially ruinous. Yes, American emergency rooms
are required to take care of anyone in acute pain, or in a condition serious enough to require immediate medical ­attention,
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but they are certainly not required to do so for free, and they’re
not required to care for ­people with potentially deadly chronic
conditions such as diabetes, which can kill you, too. The notorious bills that uninsured patients receive from hospitals for
emergency-­room treatment—­thousands of dollars for just a few
stitches—­can be incentive enough to stay home and take your
chances, even if you are seriously at risk. Hospitals might ask
uninsured patients to pay for treatment in advance, pushing debt
collectors on them even as they sit in the waiting room, and can
sue them later if they don’t pay their bills—and seize up to a
quarter of their after-­tax wages in payment.
In fact I learned that medical bills were the cause of most
personal bankruptcies in the United States, which meant that
hundreds of thousands of Americans were losing their property
and having their credit scores destroyed every year as the result
of being uninsured or underinsured for health care. In America the uninsured were reduced to begging for leniency from
hospitals, and begging from friends and family for burdensome
financial assistance in the face of their staggering medical bills.
Many ended up dragging their family members into debt along
with them.
I sat in my Brooklyn apartment and imagined with a shudder what a good impression I’d make on my new American
boyfriend’s parents if I suddenly required emergency surgery
without insurance, and needed a quick fifty thousand dollars to
cover the bill.
By now I’d developed great affection for many aspects of life
in America, and I was impressed by the fantastically high-­
tech medical technologies that American doctors and hospitals
seemed able to deploy routinely to improve health and save lives.
The cutting-­edge clinical trials and experimental treatments
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American patients had access to clearly brought unique benefits, and I knew that American medical schools and research
institutions were among the most advanced in the world. All
the same, as someone from a Nordic society, I’d also had a hard
time explaining to Americans, even to Trevor, what it was like
to move from a country with a national health-­care system such
as Finland’s to the United States.
To be sure, health care in the twenty-­first century is a huge
challenge for every nation, and no country has a perfect system.
Today even the countries that score best on global health-­care
surveys struggle with continuously rising costs, overburdened
hospitals, long wait times, and administrative nightmares. But
there are several different ways of approaching these problems,
and when you’ve experienced life with a Nordic health-­care
system, coming to America is a shock.
A few years ago an American journalist named T. R. Reid
set out to catalog what the basic approaches to health care were
around the globe. Reid identified four basic models that different societies use to manage health care for their citizens. One
model is the approach that Finland uses today, along with the
other Nordic countries—­Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Iceland, with some variations in implementation. It goes by the
name “Beveridge model,” after William Beveridge, the economist and social reformer whose 1942 report inspired Britain’s
National Health Ser­vice. The UK continues to use a version of
this approach, as do countries like Spain and Italy.
The basic idea of the Beveridge model is simple: Health
care is provided and paid for by the government through taxes,
just like other public ser­vices such as public education. As with
public schools, users of public health care pay nothing or small
copays when they go to see a doctor, and like teachers, many
doctors are full-­time salaried employees of national or local
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governments. Doctors can also be private providers paid directly
by the government. In addition, there may be other private doctors, hospitals, and insurance policies that users can choose, if
they are willing to pay for these themselves. Because the government is paying most doctors’ salaries, the expenses of the hospitals, and most of the medications, it can negotiate good deals,
which in turn keeps costs down. This is also the model that is
often presented in the United States as something to be terrified of, and which is frequently labeled with the scary-­sounding
term “socialized medicine.”
The second basic model Reid identified is the “Bismarck
model,” named for Germany’s late nineteenth-­century chancellor and used in that country as well as in Japan, Belgium,
and Switzerland. There health-­care providers such as doctors
and hospitals are private, as are the health-­insurance companies.
Employers and employees share the cost of insurance, and the
government picks up the tab for the unemployed. However—­
and this is a big “but”—­the system is not-­for-­profit; the private
insurance providers are essentially regulated charities. They are
required by law to cover everyone, and the government controls
costs by regulating medical ser­vices and fees.
The third basic model is the “National Health Insurance
model,” used in Canada and to some extent in Australia. The
providers of health care are private, but the national or local
government runs a single, unified health-­insurance program
that all users pay into and that in return pays the bills—­which
is why it’s also often referred to as a “single-­payer” system. This
arrangement allows the government to negotiate lower prices
with doctors and hospitals.
In his book The Healing of America: A Global Quest for Better,
Cheaper, and Fairer Health Care Reid points out, however, that
most of the world’s countries are too poor and disorganized to
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offer any of these three models. Instead these countries rely on a
fourth model, if it can be called a “model” at all: Patients simply
pay for whatever medical care they can afford themselves, with
no insurance or government plan to help. This is the ugly reality
for many in countries such as Cambodia, India, and Burkina
Faso, to name a few. The results of this system are, as Reid
writes, predictably straightforward and brutal: “The rich get
medical care; the poor stay sick and die.”
The American health-­care system occupies its own peculiar
niche, because it’s a hodgepodge of all four models. According
to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2014, 55 percent of Americans
had employer-­sponsored health insurance, 37 percent were covered by some form of government health-­care program, 15 percent paid for private insurance themselves, and 10.4 percent (or
33 million p­ eople) had no health insurance at all.
Most Americans under the age of sixty-­five live in a mercenary version of Germany. Employers negotiate health insurance for their employees from private insurance companies,
and the employer and employee share the cost. The insurer,
in return, is supposed to pay for treatment provided by private
doctors and hospitals. Unlike in Germany, however, the insurance companies and medical providers in America are largely
for-­profit businesses, with every incentive to charge as much as
they can and give out as little as possible. Moreover, the United
States government does not pick up the insurance tab for the
unemployed, and does not regulate prices of medical ser­vices to
manage costs.
For those over the age of sixty-­five, meanwhile, the United
States is a confusing and inadequate version of Canada. The government runs its own health insurance program—­Medicare—­
and pays most or part of the bills. Then there’s Medicaid, for the
very poor. The federal government and the states fund health
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care for particularly impoverished citizens, especially children,
pregnant women, the disabled, and the elderly, but the eligibility requirements and exact provisions vary from state to state.
You might conclude—­especially if you come from a nation
that has one of the first three models mentioned above—­that
Medicaid in the United States is rather like a national health-­
care system. However, you have to remember that in America
“poor” actually means “extremely destitute.” Many adults in
the U.S. who are struggling financially are nowhere near poor
enough to qualify for Medicaid, and many states do not offer
Medicaid to childless adults at all.
American military veterans, meanwhile, actually live in an
increasingly underfunded version of Britain or a Nordic country. The government pays the salaries of doctors and the costs
of facilities, which belong to the Veterans Health Administration. But because of America’s prolonged military campaigns in
the Middle East since 2001, the VA as a whole has been flooded
by an enormous influx of veterans that has been straining the
system. The federal government has been trying to improve the
ser­vice by adjusting funding and reforming management.
Finally, for uninsured Americans, who are usually either
young, self-­employed, unemployed, or working part-­time or for
small businesses that don’t offer health insurance (or only offer
insurance that is prohibitively expensive), the United States is
not that different from Cambodia or Burkina Faso. The uninsured have to pay out-­of-­pocket to get medical care. If they
can’t, they get emergency care, but a bill will follow, causing
many to rack up debt, lose their credit ratings, or end up in personal bankruptcy. For small or chronic conditions that aren’t
life threatening, they must either find a charity clinic, pay up, or
keep suffering.
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On that sunny April day in New York City, when I opened
that letter from Finland, I joined the ranks of this last group of
Americans. Now, when I looked down from our apartment to
the bustling street below, I no longer saw Brooklyn. All I saw
was Burkina Faso.
It’s hard to exaggerate how fundamentally the loss of health insurance destroyed my sense of personal security and well-­being.
In most other modern industrialized societies, including Finland, health care is considered a basic human right. I couldn’t
wrap my head around the thought that in my new home country, it was really considered okay for p­ eople not to get care, or if
they did, to be forced into bankruptcy as a result. I went from
incredulous to frustrated, to scared, to weepy, to angry, and back
again. It didn’t matter that for the time being I was perfectly
healthy. Each irritation in my throat meant pneumonia, and
every twinge of my knee or elbow signified surgery. A lump on
my neck meant cancer. And everything meant insurmountable
bills.
Considering that millions of p­ eople around the world lived
without health insurance for their entire lives, it was true that I
was fortunate. If things got really bad, I could always move back
to Finland. In addition I had some savings, and Trevor and I did
both have families who might be able to help us out, at least a
bit, if things got rough. By American standards I was still relatively privileged. But by Nordic standards, and by the standards
of most other advanced nations, I was in fact in actual danger of
becoming destitute.
And so it was that I joined the ranks of the haggard, overworked Americans who spend countless hours of their lives
researching their options, trying to find a less-­
bad health-­
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insurance arrangement from among many confusing, expensive, and downright terrible alternatives. And I soon discovered
that I couldn’t do it alone.
U N H E A LT H Y D E P E N D E N C I E S
When I first moved to the United States, I struggled to understand what Americans meant when they discussed whether or
not a job came with “benefits.” I envisioned subsidized gym
memberships or lunch vouchers, and wondered what all the fuss
was about. After I learned that buying health insurance on your
own was so expensive that mostly it had to be bought through
a group of some kind—­an employer, a union, a professional
association—­
and that employer-­
sponsored health insurance
usually covered that employee’s entire family as well, I started
to understand: Securing a job with benefits, or at least this one
benefit, could literally mean the difference between normal life
and bankruptcy, or even life and death.
It also struck me as peculiarly un-­American that private
businesses would be saddled with such a profound social duty.
It sounded so, well, socialist. Wasn’t the purpose of a business
to make profits, not to arrange the medical treatment of its employees? Meanwhile American citizens were dutifully paying
their taxes—­so wasn’t it the purpose of their government to
provide essential social ser­vices in return for those taxes? And
wasn’t it completely twisted that when ­people lost their jobs,
they lost their health insurance as well, right when they might
need it the most?
From the perspective of any society that claims to value and
support the autonomy of the individual, the fact that at least half
of all Americans depend on their employer for what is perhaps
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life’s most essential social ser­vice makes no sense. It severely curtails one’s freedom. P
­ eople cannot choose what kind of work life
they want without weighing the financial and medical risks for
themselves and their families of becoming, say, an entrepreneur
rather than a salaried employee, or of pursuing their dream
rather than taking a mind-­numbing desk job. Not to mention
that if you succeed in establishing a small business, and you’re
fortunate enough to grow, you’re then burdened once more
when you have to shoulder the administrative and financial
burdens of health insurance for your employees. Entrepreneurs
in the Nordic countries don’t have to worry about their own
health insurance at all. They already have it, they always will,
and they can choose to follow their dreams at least free of that
particular worry. Business owners in the Nordic countries can
offer their employees extra health coverage at a private clinic as
a perk, and many do, but this is nothing that even remotely approaches the administrative and financial burdens with which
American businesses struggle on a daily basis.
Relying on employers to arrange health insurance makes no
sense in other ways as well. Every time an American considers changing jobs, he or she faces a complete upheaval of his or
her health-­care situation, and often the frightening prospect of
a gap in coverage. A typical example: One of my acquaintances
in the United States changed jobs and found himself uninsured for three months. The insurance from the new employer
didn’t kick in immediately, and the so-­called COBRA insurance
meant to bridge such gaps was too expensive for him and his
wife without the substantial employer contribution they’d been
getting. So for ninety days they just lived their lives unprotected,
hoping for the best. Americans go on churning in and out of
various health-­insurance plans as their jobs, finances, location,
and eligibility change, but doing so is exhausting, bewildering,
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and an inefficient use of everyone’s time, energy, and money.
Worse, insurance companies know that many of their customers will leave them for another plan at some point. As a result
insurers have little incentive to cover preventive care that could
save costs in the long run. For private insurers offering plans
through employers, the best strategy is to pay as little as possible
now—­­people’s future health be damned.
Later in life, Americans have their personal freedom and independence curtailed in yet another way, again courtesy of their
health-­care system. A survey of working Americans revealed
that more than half the respondents reported that they planned
to work longer than they would like to, just so they could continue receiving health insurance through their employer.
In any Nordic country these kinds of curbs on personal freedom would be considered totally unacceptable. Nordic p­ eople
believe that everyone should work, just as Americans do—­the
level of workforce participation in the Nordic countries easily
matches or exceeds that in the United States. But it would be
unbelievable in a Nordic country that your career choices
should be dictated by health care. This is especially true in today’s twenty-­first-­century economy, in which p­ eople increasingly work on short-­term projects, as part-­time employees, or
as self-­employed freelancers. In our hypermodern world, which
requires a nimble society with a flexible, healthy workforce, separating health care from the nature of an individual’s employment is smart.
And what about ObamaCare, the much-­
discussed,
-­defended, and -­maligned Patient Protection and Affordable
Care Act that took effect in the beginning of 2014—­didn’t it
solve many of these problems? It did attempt to address some of
them, at least in theory. The new law required practically every
citizen and legal resident to buy private insurance, or other-
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wise pay a tax penalty. It helps p­ eople with low incomes lacking
affordable employer-­provided insurance by giving them tax
credits to pay for insurance. It makes it easier for individuals
to buy insurance directly through online Web sites—­the infamous “exchanges” that suffered so many problems when they
were rolled out—­thus enabling freelancers, the unemployed,
and owners and employees of small businesses to get insurance.
It is, in fact, created with p­ eople like Trevor and me in mind.
In practice, however, it still has many problems, as I quickly
discovered.
Once Trevor and I got married, I got my American “Green
Card,” the coveted residence permit that would allow me to
work freely for American employers. In theory this would allow
me to get a job with employer-­sponsored health insurance. In
addition I’d now have the option of joining Trevor’s health plan
for freelancers, as his official spouse. I started hunting for a job
but my résumé, which consisted mostly of editing and writing
articles in Finnish, along with the worst economic recession in the
United States since the 1930s, did not exactly have employers in
New York rushing to hire me. Trevor and I sat down and pored
over our finances, and the latest health-­insurance plans offered
by the Freelancers Union. We were making money, but our sad
conclusion was that the health plans for freelancers that included
a spouse were much too expensive for us. We were stuck.
And thus I experienced, firsthand, another type of unhealthy dependency that the American health-­
care system
pushes p­ eople into: not just unhealthy dependencies on employers, but unhealthy dependencies among family members. Since
my prospects of finding a decent job were so slim, I now did
what many Americans do: I told my spouse that he’d better get
a job that provided us both with health coverage.
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By then I’d already encountered quite a few American
­couples who lived with such arrangements. Although one spouse
might want to change careers or become self-­employed, nevertheless they’d agreed that he or she would stick with the job
they had. The main reason, of course, was that the entire family
relied on the health insurance that went with that job. Having
grown up with the Nordic theory of love, with its basic principle that healthy relationships between p­ eople are built on the
true independence of each individual, financial and otherwise,
such arrangements felt to me dangerously conducive to resentment. When one person has to put part of their own potential
or dream on hold, or quash it altogether, while their spouse and
children rely on that person’s sacrifice, everyone is being subtly
held emotional hostage. It is just this sort of arrangement, and
the tarnishing of otherwise loving relationships, that the Nordic
theory of love is intended to avoid.
For many Americans arrangements like these do not appear
problematic on the surface. The family is seen as a unit that
works to the benefit of all its members, and if one person in the
family is happy in a job that provides health insurance, there
doesn’t seem to be any problem at all. And even if that one
person would prefer to become self-­employed, or make other
decisions that would complicate the family’s access to health
care, isn’t it only right that they put their family first? Making
sacrifices is part of being in a relationship and having a family.
Certainly on a basic level that’s just as true in Nordic countries
as anywhere else.
Yet such dependencies in relationships are a slippery slope.
Sacrifices and resentments can accumulate silently, even subconsciously, and undermine the interactions of p­eople who
otherwise love one another. The goal of the Nordic theory of
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love is to prevent this corrosion of relationships, and to do so by
creating social arrangements that allow everyone to give love
as freely as possible, without strings attached. Calculations of
who owes whom what, or who makes what sacrifices, should
not be part of the emotional equation. That way the family becomes a team with each individual contributing to the whole
from a position of independence and personal strength. Today
our modern expectations—­in the Nordic countries as well as in
much of the United States—­are that individuals should have
this basic independence, while still being part of families and
communities. But the outdated American approach to health
care undermines that ideal, and this seemed especially tragic to
me because it was so unnecessary.
Despite all of my qualms, however, if I wanted to stay in the
United States and have health insurance, I had no choice but to
become dependent on Trevor. In the process Trevor would have
to make career choices and sacrifices that he might not otherwise have made, complicating our relationship with potential
resentments, and deepening my psychological dependence on
him. Fortunately Trevor did manage to land a teaching job that
offered health benefits for both of us. I was relieved—­until he
came home from a meeting with his new employer and told me
what it would cost.
Having heard so much about “employer-­sponsored health
plans,” somehow I’d assumed that they would be cheap, or even
practically free, for employees—­wasn’t that why it was called
a “benefit”? I hadn’t yet understood that a wide range of plans
and costs existed, and that one had to be savvy enough to navigate them. I also hadn’t yet realized the extent to which Trevor’s
new profession of teaching wasn’t the highly respected profession in the United States that it was in Finland.
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Later I would research the average costs of employer-­
sponsored plans in the United States. According to a report by
the Kaiser Family Foundation, the total average annual premiums for employer-­sponsored health insurance in 2015—­in
other words, the combined amount paid by the employee and
the employer for the insurance—­came to $6,251 for single coverage and $17,545 for family coverage. If you looked only at the
amount that just the employee had to pay, from his or her own
salary, the average annual share was $1,071 for single coverage
and $4,955 for family coverage. But I also learned it is not unheard of for families to pay up to $15,000 of their own money
every year, even for employer-­sponsored health insurance.
In addition to premiums, of course, most employer-­based
plans have an annual deductible that requires patients to pay a
certain amount of their costs themselves first (on average, $1,318
for single coverage). The majority of American workers also
have to shell out copayments for office visits with physicians, as
well as part of the cost of their prescription drugs. Gradually I
came to realize that when an American says how much they pay
for their insurance each month, it tells you nothing until they
clarify their deductibles, copays, coinsurances, the extent of the
coverage, and all the other terms I had never heard of before in
my life. Mostly, the bigger the employer, the better the deal for
employees.
Trevor’s new employer was, unfortunately, not big, and
teaching in America, especially at a small institution, could provide some awfully small “benefits.” With Trevor’s new salaried
job, our only option for health insurance was a family plan—­
there was no spouse-­only option—­that would cost $790 a month
for the two of us. And that was after the employer had kicked in
around half of the total cost. Granted, our payments would be a
bit less than the freelancer’s plans we’d been looking at, but this
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was not at all what I’d been expecting. In fact, it was more than
double the national average for a family plan at the time, and we
didn’t even have kids.
I did my best to take this latest blow with grace. But nine and
a half thousand dollars a year sounded like an enormous sum,
and there were copays on top of it. This was another of those
moments when I felt I really wasn’t cut out for life in America. Tears started to stream down my face. Trevor watched me
silently for a while, and then softly asked, “Have I told you lately
that I’m insanely in love with you?”
We hugged each other tightly. Two lovers, tortured by the
American health-­care system. I almost laughed through my
tears. So this was the drama of romance, American-­style. Life
had been so different for me before.
WHO’S THE BEST?
Living my life in Finland, I’d received my primary medical care
from a variety of sources. When I was a kid I’d visited either the
school nurse, a public clinic, a public hospital that specialized
in treating children, or sometimes a private doctor paid for by
my parents. In college I used a publicly funded student health
center. Later, when I was a working adult, I usually just went
to my local public clinic. Occasionally I saw the private doctor
offered to me for minor illnesses by my employer. And at other
times I chose to see a private dermatologist or gynecologist outside either the public system or my employer’s plan.
So what would all this cost me? When I went to the public
clinic, I might owe a copay of some twenty dollars for the first
few visits of the year. Once I’d reached a cap, there was hardly
anything more to pay out of pocket. In 2016, the combined
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annual out-­
of-­
pocket maximum for most ser­
vices—­
public
clinics, emergency rooms, tests, operations—­for every person
in Finland was about $750, no matter what kind of treatment
you’d received or how expensive it was. If I’d had to take prescription drugs, my out-­of-­pocket copays for those would also
have been capped; in 2016 the annual maximum was about
$660. And if I’d been poor, Finland’s social ser­vices program
would have helped me with the copays, too. Many medications
for serious long-­term illnesses such as diabetes, multiple sclerosis, or cancer are covered at special rates, with the patient paying
less than five dollars per prescription.
Meanwhile, if I went to see a doctor who’d been made available through my employer, the visit was simply free. On the
other hand, if I went to a private doctor outside my employer’s
plan, I paid most of the bill myself, although the government
generally subsidized these visits as well.
I usually made my choice about where to go for primary
care based on little more than which location was most practical and could give me an appointment fastest. I didn’t really
worry about differences in the quality of care, because there isn’t
much difference between the private and public primary care
physicians in Finland, apart from the question of who pays the
bill. Many doctors split their time working for both the public
and private sector. Municipalities sometimes buy ser­vices from
private providers, while employers sometimes buy ser­vices from
public clinics. Private clinics can often offer an appointment
faster, while public clinics are cheaper or free.
Should something serious turn out to be wrong with you,
though, all these primary care providers will send you to one address: the public hospital. Private clinics and hospitals in Finland
mainly offer care for conditions that are not life threatening, in
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such specialties as ophthalmology—­say, cataracts—­gynecology,
dermatology, and dental care, or surgery for sports injuries. The
more involved and expensive care for more life-­threatening
issues, such as cancer treatments or cardiac operations, is almost
completely the domain of the public sector. When it comes to
the big stuff, the country simply takes care of you, at negligible
cost to you. Period.
Finns and some other Nordic citizens have legitimate grievances with the current state of their health care. In the public
hospital system, if you require nonemergency or elective surgery,
the waits can be long. For example, in 2014 the average wait for
cataract surgery was only about thirty days in the Netherlands,
but almost three times that in Finland (the same wait existed in
Portugal). The average wait for a hip replacement was about
forty days in the Netherlands, but 116 days in Finland.
Americans might assume that long waits for these sorts
of surgeries are the inevitable result of having a health-­care
system run by the government. But that’s not the case. A study
in 2014 by the Commonwealth Fund, a private foundation specializing in health-­care research, ranked Britain, which also
uses the Beveridge model, as fourth in the world in access to
specialists, right after the United States. Britain has also shortened its wait times dramatically from the past—­all it took was
for the government to commit the right additional resources.
So for Finland this is a solvable problem, and the Finnish government has already taken steps to address it. Patients in the
Netherlands, Germany, and France, all of which have national
health-­care systems of one kind or another, have faster access
to nonemergency and elective surgery than do patients in the
United States.
Even so, the next thing I can imagine an American saying
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about all this is: America has the best doctors and the most advanced medical treatments in the world. Americans are willing
to put up with their system because no public health care can
compete with that. Right?
It’s hard to make any unequivocal statements about the quality of care between health-­care systems in wealthy nations, but
two things can be said for sure. One: Wealthy ­people tend to
get more care than the poor almost everywhere. And two: Of
all the developed nations, the country that has the most severe
extremes of this sort of inequality is the United States.
Everyone agrees that the United States is home to some
of the world’s best medical schools, highest-­skilled doctors,
most productive research institutes, best-­equipped hospitals,
and most innovative treatments. If you have the money in the
United States, you absolutely can get world-­class care. But here’s
the thing that somehow escapes American awareness in this
discussion: Everyone else in all the other wealthy industrialized
countries—­absolutely including all the ones that have universal
national health-­care systems—­is also getting world-­class care.
And they get it whether or not they have a fancy insurance plan
and a huge reserve of personal wealth.
In addition to conducting surveys on education, the
OECD—­the joint organization of wealthy nations—­studies
health care in different countries. According to its research,
the United States as a whole does not actually outshine other
countries in the quality of care. The United States has shorter
life expectancy, higher infant mortality, and fewer physicians
relative to the population than most other developed countries,
including the Nordic nations. When we look at outcomes in
some dramatic illnesses, such as cancer, the United States does
have some of the best survival rates in the world—­right after or
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ahead of the Nordic countries. The rankings vary marginally
here and there, but overall the United States and the Nordic nations achieve very similar results in how long patients live after
a cancer diagnosis.
However, there is a particularly important respect in which
the United States has performed considerably worse than the
Nordic nations. A Commonwealth Fund study from 2011 concluded that in comparison with sixteen other industrialized
countries, Americans under the age of seventy-­five were the
most likely to die of conditions that are at least partially preventable or treatable. These include bacterial infections, diabetes, heart disease, stroke, or complications of common surgical
procedures. As many as 91,000 fewer Americans would die prematurely if the United States could achieve the rate of the leading country, which was France—­a nation with a strong national
health-care system using a variation of the Bismarck model,
with public and private providers and regulated, nonprofit insurance plans. Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Denmark all performed better in this regard than did the United States. When
the Commonwealth Fund compared American health care with
eleven other nations on criteria such as quality, access, efficiency,
equity, and healthy lives, the United States ranked dead last.
American patients skip care because of costs more often
than do patients in other countries, and American doctors are
more embroiled in what the Commonwealth Fund calls “administrative hassles.” So despite America’s strengths in the kind
of high-­tech and dramatic emergency hospital care that you
see on TV—­I have been addicted to the show Grey’s Anatomy
for years—­American health care also has severe weaknesses.
The American cardiologist-­
turned-­
author Sandeep Jauhar
summarized the state of health care in the United States in an
interview about his book Doctored: The Disillusionment of an
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American ­Physician on National Public Radio. “American medicine,” Jauhar told NPR listeners, “is the best in the world when
it comes to providing high-­tech care. If you have an esoteric disease, you want to be in the United States. God forbid you have
Ebola, our academic medical centers are second to none. But if
you have run-­of-­the-­mill chronic diseases like congestive heart
failure or diabetes, the system is not designed to find you the
best possible care. And that’s what has to change.”
And compared with Nordic citizens, Americans are losing
their freedom and independence in yet another way: financially.
When it comes to health-­care costs, the U.S. system means that
Americans are getting robbed.
T H E P R I C E W E PAY
One fine spring day in New York City I was having coffee with
an American friend whose wife had given birth in the previous
year. He mentioned they had recently received a number of unexpected bills from the doctors involved and from the hospital,
six months after the fact, related to the delivery. The bills ran
into the thousands of dollars. He and his wife had insurance,
and he hadn’t been aware that these bills would be coming, but
he assured me it wasn’t a huge problem. He’d called the hospital, and the collections office had agreed to lower the amounts
based on the ­couples’ earnings. Now they were paying fifty dollars a month toward the remaining bill of a thousand dollars
or so. He also mentioned that overall, he felt his insurance had
been good. A few years back he’d had surgery on the same plan.
The cost of the surgery had been more than ten thousand dollars, but his share had been only around fifteen hundred dollars.
I had just returned from a trip to Finland, and I was speech-
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less. It wasn’t that I hadn’t heard a story like his many times
before. One friend in New York had to pay $950 for the extraction of a wisdom tooth, since she didn’t have dental insurance. Another acquaintance’s wife went to the emergency room
to have a glass fragment removed from her foot. The hospital
took X-­rays that revealed nothing, and the doctor told her to see
a specialist. Then they sent her a bill for $1,244. One friend with
an affordable corporate insurance plan, including dental, found
that none of the doctors who specialized in fixing the particular
problem she had with her jaw took any insurance, so she had
to pay $1,600 out of pocket. What rendered me speechless was
not the bills and costs themselves, although I did find them outrageous, but the fact that my American friends didn’t seem to
realize there was anything strange about all this.
For sure, many Americans with good jobs and high-­end insurance don’t end up paying much extra for their care. But even
for many middle-­class Americans, underinsurance that results
in extra medical bills is a terrible problem. A Harvard study surveyed p­ eople who were being forced to declare personal bankruptcy as the result of an illness. The majority of them turned
out to be middle aged, middle class, and college educated, and
they’d had health insurance at least at some point during their
ordeal. Their financial troubles resulted from a combination
of copays, prescription drug costs, and bills from doctors and
hospitals rising into the tens of thousands of dollars, as well as
from lost income during their illness. Even when Americans
have health insurance, they mortgage their homes and borrow
money to pay medical bills.
ObamaCare was partly intended to solve some of these
problems. For example, the Affordable Care Act put limits on
copays for preventive ser­vices, and it capped annual out-­of-­
pocket maximums for most policies. In 2016, these caps were
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$6,850 for an individual, and $13,700 for a family plan. That’s
still a lot of money. And ObamaCare didn’t solve the problem of
insurance companies sticking patients with humongous bills for
ser­vices that the insurers decide they’re simply going to refuse
to cover, not to mention costs for out-­of-­network treatment that
is often impossible to avoid. All this would be utterly unheard
of in Finland.
Americans tend to assume, of course, that ­people in Nordic
countries are also getting a rotten deal. Nordics, after all, have
to fork out so much in taxes over the years to pay for their public
health-­care system.
Before I discuss the very interesting question of taxes—­
which I’ll get to in the next chapter—­here are the comparative
statistics specifically on health-­care spending. Regardless of how
health care is paid for—­through taxes or private insurance or
direct payments from patients—­each country spends a certain
amount on health care for every citizen. Finland’s per-­person
spending is, along with Iceland’s, about average among the
OECD countries. How about the United States? The quality
of the medical care in the United States is, as we’ve seen, pretty
much identical to, or in some areas slightly worse than, Nordic
medical care. Yet Americans are paying, per person, two and a
half times what citizens of Finland and Iceland pay. In fact the
United States now spends more on health care than any other
country in the world by a wide margin.
How come?
In 2013 the normal delivery of a baby in the United States cost
on average $10,000—­four times as much as in Spain. An MRI
fetched more than $1,000, compared with $140 in Switzerland.
American bypass surgery cost $75,350, or almost five times as
much as in the Netherlands. The average cost of a hospital day
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in the United States was more than $4,000, as opposed to $480 in
Spain. How is it possible that Americans end up paying so vastly
much more for exactly the same ser­vices?
Several American investigative journalists have set out to
answer exactly this question, and their discoveries have been
stunning. To begin with, American hospitals routinely charge
such high prices for even the smallest items that the practice
could be called fraudulent—­if it weren’t perfectly legal. Steven
Brill’s extensive report “Bitter Pill: Why Medical Bills Are Killing Us” in Time detailed hospital billings of $1.50 for a generic
painkiller that you can buy a hundred of on Amazon for $1.49,
$18.00 for an individual diabetes-­test strip that Amazon sold
in boxes of fifty for $27.85, or 55 cents each, and $13,702.00 for
an injection of a cancer drug that costs the hospital less than
$4,000.00
A series of articles in the New York Times by Elisabeth Rosenthal, tagged, “Paying till it hurts,” also showed how Americans
are systematically charged more for drugs, scans, and procedures
than are patients in other developed countries. “Americans pay,
on average, about four times as much for a hip replacement as
patients in Switzerland or France and more than three times
as much for a Caesarean section as those in New Zealand or
Britain,” Rosenthal revealed. “The average price for Nasonex,
a common nasal spray for allergies, is $108 in the United States
compared with $21 in Spain.” Drawing on a report by the Commonwealth Fund, Rosenthal went on to compare hospital stays
in the United States with those in other developed countries.
She found that while hospital stays in the United States were no
longer than those in other countries, they nevertheless cost three
times as much.
There are a variety of reasons for the high cost of health care
in the United States, and a lot of them are related to the fact that
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it’s an old-­fashioned, free-­for-­all of private arrangements, rather
than a modernized, rationalized, national system with clear regulations. American insurance companies negotiate prices down
as much as they can, but often their bargaining power is limited. There are only so many hospitals in most areas, and those
hospitals have also been consolidating to create more powerful
private entities. By buying up doctors’ practices and forming in-­
house labs, hospitals have managed to form near monopolies,
increasing their leverage against insurers, which allows them to
charge more.
In addition American hospitals treat many health issues
with heavy-­handed and expensive methods, whereas their European counterparts will often choose a less intrusive solution
that’s just as effective. When it comes to delivering babies, for
example, the American rate for C-­sections is much higher than
in other developed countries, and needless to say, each American C-­section costs more than it does elsewhere. Pharmaceutical
companies, for their part, keep gouging Americans with higher
drug prices than they charge elsewhere in the world. American
insurance companies, hospitals, and doctors also all spend extraordinary amounts of money on administration, because the
complexity of America’s private system has created multiple
layers and separate areas of management as well as various middlemen. Not to mention the huge sums that American health-­
care companies and providers spend on advertising to drum up
more business.
A lot of these drivers of excessive cost simply don’t exist in
other countries. There are far fewer bills, forms, and disputed
claims when care is provided by a public hospital, or paid for
by a single public insurance provider, nor is there any need to
advertise. As the New York Times has noted, many of the typi-
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cal professions that soak up consumer dollars in the American
health-care industry—­medical coders, claims adjusters, and
care navigators, to name a few—­are unnecessary and unheard
of in other countries.
Then there are American doctors. They order more tests
than do doctors in other countries, and Americans are charged
more for those tests, as well as for their medical devices and
drugs. American doctors also take a much bigger cut of all these
charges for themselves than do their European counterparts,
and they often have extensive financial arrangements with laboratories, device makers, and drug companies that can skew their
incentives and entice them to choose a more expensive form of
care, beyond what is medically necessary.
I have family members in Finland who are doctors and
dentists. They earn a comfortable income, but their homes are
normal homes in ordinary suburbs or in apartment buildings,
and no one is driving Porsches. Based on an OECD report,
Finnish doctors who are general practitioners earn twice the
average Finnish salary, which is pretty darn good. Specialists
in Finland do even better: They earn two and a half times the
average salary. But for American doctors the earnings premium
is dramatically higher. In the United States general practitioners
earn three and a half times the average American salary. American specialists take home five and a half times the average.
American doctors do work longer hours than Finnish doctors, but this doesn’t wholly explain the higher earnings, since
doctors in Canada and France work similar hours but make less.
One of the biggest justifications American doctors tend to give
for their high salaries is that they have to pay off the debt for
their very expensive educations themselves. It’s true that this is
not an expense doctors trained in Finland have to worry about,
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since medical school in Finland—­if you can get in—­is free. Another justification for the high incomes of doctors in the United
States is the expensive malpractice insurance they’re forced to
buy. In Finland such costs are negligible.
In all fairness, though, it is not the doctors who earn the
most in American medicine. That dubious honor goes to the
real bosses of American health-­care profits: hospital administrators and insurance company executives.
Who pays the price for all this? The average American.
Not long ago a man in the United States known as “Steve H.”
needed a neurostimulator implanted in his back. He had health
insurance, and he went to an American hospital for the one-­
day surgery. The tale of Steve H.’s operation, which is both
remarkable and totally commonplace, was one of the stories reported by Steven Brill in Time. The operation went well, but
afterward Steve H. received a bill, despite having insurance.
The bill included, as Brill puts it, “all the usual and customary
overcharges.” For example, among the many itemized entries
was “STRAP OR TABLE 8X27 IN,” for $31. Brill explains:
“That’s the strap used to hold Steve H. onto the operating table.
Just below that was ‘BLNKT WARM UPPER BDY 42268’ for
$32. That’s a blanket used to keep surgery patients warm. It is,
of course, reusable, and it’s available new on eBay for $13. Four
lines down there’s ‘GOWN SURG ULTRA XLG 95121’ for
$39, which is the gown the surgeon wore. Thirty of them can be
bought online for $180. Neither Medicare nor any large insurance company would pay a hospital separately for those straps
or the surgeon’s gown; that’s all supposed to come with the facility fee paid to the hospital, which in this case was $6,289.”
The total for Steve H.’s one-­day operation came to $86,951.
Steve H.’s insurance only agreed to pay out $45,000. The total
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amount that Steve H. himself now owed the hospital to pay for
all those inflated charges was still $40,000. And that didn’t even
include the doctors’ bills.
Compare this with the case of an acquaintance of mine in
Finland. He had been suffering from numbness, pain in his
back, and a burning sensation in his hand. After a few weeks
of waiting to see if the pain would go away, he saw a doctor
and learned that he would need surgery. He had the option to
have the surgery in a private hospital, but he elected to use a
public hospital that was part of Helsinki University. Afterward
he spent a few hours in the ICU, followed by an overnight stay
in the regular wing of the hospital. He was home the next day,
and then got six weeks of paid sick leave. He, too, received a
bill for the operation. His reaction to the bill was strong enough
that he decided to post it on Facebook: “Just received a bill from
the hospital. MRI pictures of the neck and the following neurosurgeon’s appointment €29. Removal of two prolapsed vertebral
discs by the most experienced neurosurgeon on neck problems
in Finland + one night stay in the hospital €69.60. Total cost
€98.60.”
Forty thousand dollars, versus ninety-­nine euros, which
comes to about $105. My acquaintance was very happy with his
care. Especially with the price.
How do Nordic countries keep costs so low? Many Americans believe they know the reason: death panels.
D E AT H PA N E L S
What many Americans fear most about public health care is
the idea that in countries with public health-­care systems, the
government unfairly—­
and maybe even secretly—­
limits the
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­ edical treatment that ­people can receive. This fear was infam
mously given voice by former Alaska governor and vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin. Health-­care reform in the United
States, Palin claimed, would lead to “death panels” of bureaucrats who would decide which p­ eople were “worthy of medical
care.” Palin’s claim was quickly debunked. America’s new Affordable Care Act—­ObamaCare—­included no provisions that
would cause any individual to be judged worthy or unworthy
of medical treatment. Later the fact-­checking outfit PolitiFact
actually named Palin’s false claim the number-­one “Lie of the
Year.”
Nevertheless many Americans continued to believe that
Palin’s statement was true, the assumption being that part of
the way that Finland and the other Nordic countries reduce the
medical bills of their citizens is in fact by having something like
what Palin was describing—­if not “death panels,” at least committees of government number crunchers who rule out lifesaving procedures that are too expensive. This is simply not the
case. As in the United States, in the Nordic countries there are
no committees that pass judgment on whether or not a patient
will get care. Such decisions are left up to individual doctors
in consultation with patients. That said, doctors and patients in
Nordic countries do face limitations, of course, exactly the same
limitations faced by doctors and patients in the United States in
dealing with private insurance companies—­namely, whether or
not certain treatments or drugs are covered. The difference is
that in Finland and the other Nordic countries, the process for
deciding which treatments and drugs are covered is reasonable,
transparent, and accountable to citizens. That goes for pricing, too. Nothing could be further from the American way of
doing things.
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Absurd as it might seem, in the United States it is nearly impossible for anyone—­consumers and experts alike—­to actually
find out in advance what a medical test or procedure is going
to cost. When I finally got my first American health-­insurance
plan through Trevor’s new job, I read the thick benefits book
the insurance company sent, but I could understand little of it.
The terminology was confusing, the rules more so.
Asking around, I discovered that my bewilderment was not
at all unusual. In medical matters big and small in America,
patients will mostly discover the price of their care only after
the fact, even if they are stuck paying for it themselves. When
a group of researchers from Iowa University telephoned more
than a hundred American hospitals—­two from each state, as
well as Washington, DC—­to request the lowest complete price,
including hospital and physician fees, for a hypothetical hip replacement for a sixty-­two-­year-­old grandmother, only one in
ten hospitals was able to provide the full price, and even then
the prices ranged from $11,000 to $125,000.
Patients aren’t the only ones entangled in America’s confounding, chaotic, and outdated patchwork of medical and
insurance providers, and losing their precious time and resources trying to manage costs and plan their care. Increasingly,
so are doctors.
An American acquaintance of mine who works as a
genetic counselor described the problem of medical pricing in
the United States from her perspective. Since each patient has a
different insurance plan, a doctor often has no idea what a test
or treatment is going to cost the patient, and the doctor can’t
spend all day on the phone calling everyone’s insurance companies. Even when they try to figure it out, she said, often they can’t.
“I stood around for ten minutes on Friday with a cardiologist
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and a cardiology fellow debating whether or not to send a
genetic test on an inpatient or wait until they were an outpatient,” she wrote once in a Facebook post. “We were trying to
figure out how to keep the family from getting a huge bill, but
to answer that question would have required knowing if they
had met their deductible for the year, if they had met their out-­
of-­pocket maximum for the year, and what percentage of the
testing their insurance would cover if they hadn’t. There is NO
WAY we could answer those questions on a Friday night—­plus
it’s a really lousy use of our time.”
Nonetheless many American doctors do spend countless
hours calling insurance companies to get prior authorization for
expensive drugs that the insurance companies would prefer not
to cover. A Commonwealth Fund report found that more than
half of American doctors report that the time they have to spend
trying to secure drug or treatment coverage for their patients is
a major problem—­a bigger percentage than in any of the other
eleven countries that were surveyed.
As a patient, if you don’t know what a treatment is going
to cost you, sometimes it may not matter all that much, especially if your employer has done a good job at picking the plans
they offer. But sometimes it does matter. One friend’s doctor
had recommended what the doctor described as a routine heart
test for my friend’s new baby, just to make sure everything was
fine. The parents agreed—­who wouldn’t?—­thinking “routine”
meant covered. Only later did they discover that their insurance
did not cover the exam, and a bill of a thousand dollars followed.
Many Americans have come to believe that the reason you
can’t really know what anything is going to cost is simple. With
for-­profit hospitals loading their bills with “all the usual and
customary overcharges,” as Steven Brill put it, what for-­profit
insurance companies do is first deny every claim they can, and
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then wait to see whether, and how much, you’re going to fight
back.
Let’s be frank: This sort of behavior has no place in a
modern civilized nation, not when we’re talking about providing citizens with a ser­vice as essential as health care. Health care
in the United States has regressed to such a Wild West state
of affairs that patients, who in most cases are already suffering
from an illness or other health problem as it is, also must additionally endure frustration, anxiety, and anger as they are forced
to spend vast amounts of time and energy just fighting for the
basic right to have their care covered.
No Nordic citizen has to put up with anything like this.
Nordic societies today have all decided that health care in a
modern nation should be a fundamental human right, and as
such, it makes the most sense to provide health care as a basic
social ser­vice. Along with just about every other wealthy industrialized nation—­except the United States—­this means that the
Nordic countries regulate the cost of medical ser­vices and drugs
in a centralized manner, which prevents all of the pricing insanity so commonplace in America.
Take prescription drugs in Finland, for example. In this
case there is indeed a “panel,” and because it’s a very important
one, its decisions are open to public scrutiny. The panel consists
not of death-­dispensing bureaucrats but of medical experts—­
doctors, professors, and pharmacists—­and its job is to review
applications from pharmaceutical companies to have new drugs
covered by the public system. The panel bases its decisions on
studies of the drugs’ effectiveness, and determines a maximum
wholesale price as well as reimbursement rates for approved
drugs. If the drug is approved, the public health-­care system
will pay much of its cost. In 2013 the committee’s negotiations
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with pharmaceutical companies ended with 95 percent of applications accepted.
None of that, by the way, prevents patients in Finland from
paying out of their own pocket for a drug that the national
system doesn’t cover. Once a drug has been approved for sale
either by the European Union or Finland’s agency overseeing
medicine—­the equivalent of the FDA in the United States—­
the drug company is free to sell it at any price and anyone can
buy it, as long as he or she has a prescription and the money.
This is exactly the same as in the United States. The price is
restricted only for drugs covered by the public system.
Finland’s system for evaluating and regulating the effectiveness of drugs and treatments has several key advantages over
the laissez-­faire approach in America. The most obvious advantage is that it helps the country control health-­care costs by
weeding out expensive yet ineffective treatments, or drugs that
have a more affordable alternative. The downside is that there
are cases where a drug that serves some part of the population is
deemed too expensive to be covered.
However, since the decisions are open to public scrutiny,
they can be challenged by taxpaying citizens. Compare this
with the United States, where calculations over what to cover,
and by how much, are most often made by private insurance
companies, usually in secret. Reimbursements vary widely, for
no reason that patients or even doctors can discern, leaving patients with no recourse, wondering why their plan covers one
treatment but not another, and why the patient next to them
with different insurance might get access to both. It’s ironic
that Americans so often dislike the idea of public health care
because they think government will force decisions on them.
Yet, unlike the private sector, in a democracy it is government
ser­vices that are the one area that must be transparent, and that
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can be openly examined, explained, and questioned. A perfect
example is the United States Veterans Administration, whose
health-­care system has recently been scrutinized, and as a result
is now undergoing reforms. While governments make mistakes
and might try to obfuscate their failures, it is private providers
in the United States that, as we’ve seen over and over with “all
the usual and customary overcharges,” can’t be trusted.
The fact that the current approach to health care in the
United States generally avoids cost calculations up front may
sound good at the outset. Naturally ­people want their doctors to
choose the most effective care for them, even if it is expensive.
Not considering costs, however, is causing Americans to get less
value for their money, because expensive options are used even
when cheaper ones would be just as effective. Some Americans
have even started to plead with their doctors to take cost into
account when making decisions about treatment, because more
and more patients are realizing that they are likely to be the ones
stuck with the impossibly high bill.
Pleading with one’s doctor, however, is itself also becoming
an exercise in frustration—­and an exercise in suspicion—­for
many Americans. Out-­of-­control costs and the many other injustices that have become endemic to medical treatment in the
United States are starting to undermine the very bedrock of the
American health-­care system: trust in one’s own doctor.
The recent spread of the anti-­vaccination movement is one of
the more visible symptoms of this trend. However, I also encountered this mistrust among many of my American acquaintances in a more everyday way. More and more I noticed them
voicing their suspicion that their doctors were pushing excessive diagnoses, expensive tests, and invasive operations on them
in order to make money, rather than out of medical necessity.
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Many had turned to the Internet instead, in search of alternatives such as dietary regimens or other noninvasive treatments.
A Harvard study from 2014 showed that while the majority
of Americans were satisfied with their most recent physician’s
visit, trust in the medical profession as a whole in the United
States had plummeted since the 1960s. Of twenty-­nine countries
surveyed, the United States came in twenty-­fourth in the proportion of adults who trust doctors.
To doctors this type of suspicious thinking can be frustrating. They’ve studied for years, maybe decades, to master their
trade, they work exceptionally hard, and they aim to heal their
patients, not to harm them. But no matter how unfair doctors
feel such accusations to be, the suspicions held by growing
numbers of Americans are not unwarranted. The United States
does, for example, clearly have a more medicalized approach to
pregnancy and delivery than many other countries, with unusually high rates of C-­sections. Some patients might think
this a good thing. But as the OECD has noted, approaches to
birthing that rely on midwives instead of obstetricians are just
as effective. In fact a review of studies found that births led
by midwives resulted in fewer complications than ones led by
obstetricians.
Similarly, American doctors order far more tests than do
their counterparts elsewhere. They order more MRI tests per
capita than any other OECD country. On the surface this, too,
could seem like a good thing—­more tests, better care. But according to the OECD, evidence suggests instead that Americans simply overuse CT and MRI exams. “Many studies have
attempted to assess tangible medical benefits of the substantial
increase in CT and MRI examinations in the United States,”
the OECD notes in a report, “but have found no conclusive
evidence of such benefits.” American doctors also prescribe
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far more antibiotics than Nordic doctors do, despite extensive
studies showing that the more antibiotics are prescribed in a
community, the more resistant bacterial strains will take root
there.
Not that the Nordic countries are entirely immune from
some of this. The vast new troves of health information that are
becoming available online have created a new trend of patients
second-­guessing doctors in the Nordic countries just as in the
United States. However, in the Nordic countries, patients are
not usually suspicious that their doctors might be putting profits
ahead of ethics. In a country such as Finland, patients certainly
might worry that cuts in health-­care budgets could be leading to
longer wait times, or to doctors whose schedules are too rushed.
But rarely would a Finn have any cause to suspect that a doctor
working in the public system could be personally benefiting
from a particular care decision. Most doctors are simply salaried
employees, and their compensation does not primarily depend
on the number of tests or operations they perform. It’s hard to
overstate what a difference this makes compared with the way
the American system is structured, and how much better Finns
and other Nordic citizens are served by their health-­care system
as a result.
Given the growing distrust of doctors in the United States,
perhaps it’s no wonder that Americans place so much emphasis
on being able to find a doctor they like. In fact, perhaps being
able to choose one’s doctor is one of the few redeeming qualities of the United States approach. Surely Americans would lose
that freedom with a public health-­care system like Finland’s.
Or would they? And what does it even mean to have the
freedom to choose who provides your health care, and the freedom to choose how it’s provided? Does that freedom actually
set you free?
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T H E R I G H T TO C H O O S E
About a year before I moved to New York, my brother Mikko
married his girlfriend, Veera, in a lovely little town in the Finnish countryside. An American family who were close friends
of my mother’s since her student exchange year in Ohio almost
fifty years earlier had come all the way from the United States
for the ceremony. In a fragrant orchard at a long table, I sat
talking with two sisters from the American family. The possibility of my move to the United States was looming in my mind,
and there were so many things I felt I still needed to understand.
At some point our conversation turned to going to the doctor,
and I asked the sisters how much it mattered to them that they
be able to choose their own physician.
“I absolutely want to choose my own doctor,” one of them
said instantly. She then went on to describe how, when faced
with a serious illness, she’d launched into an intensive program
of discovery for herself, researching everything she could about
the condition online, cataloging possible treatments, calling
friends and relatives for advice on securing the best doctor, and
advocating strongly for the treatments she felt were most appropriate for her. She wanted to be in control of her own destiny,
she told me firmly.
I had never thought of doctors that way. If I were suddenly
seriously ill, the last thing I’d want to have to do, on top of dealing with my fear and discomfort, would be charging ahead with
the onerous task of researching doctors, treatments, hospitals,
and prices. I’d want the doctors to take charge. They were the
experts, not me.
Immediately, my own attitude made me feel weak and pathetic compared to this visitor from America. Apparently, I
was willing to surrender my life thoughtlessly into the hands
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of strangers, without standing up for myself. I admired the
way Americans seemed so consistently to take responsibility for
themselves, no matter what the situation, without ever expecting anyone else to do it for them. Certainly much of what has
made America great has been this attitude of self-­determination.
Losing the capacity for self-­determination is one of the
things that many Americans worry about the most. A few years
after that conversation, I ran across an online comment on an
American newspaper’s Web site, written by a vocal Internet
commentator by the name of Guy Thompto. The comment
struck me deeply, especially as someone who had grown up, as I
had, on the border of the Soviet Union. “Sometimes freedom is
taken away in large chunks, such as when the tanks rolled into
Eastern Europe,” Thompto wrote. But then he went on, and
now he was talking about health care: “Sometimes freedom is
scrubbed away, one layer at a time—­such as when your freedom
to freely choose the physician you want, what you are willing
to pay, and what coverage you deem necessary for yourself and
your family is taken away. ­People sometimes tell us that taking
away these freedoms is for our own good, or sometimes for the
good of the less fortunate. . . . We are told that if we disagree, we
are greedy—­or more often, ignorant.”
Had I been coddled by the state back in Finland to such
an extent that I’d developed a childish trust in the choices the
government had made for me—­whether in schools or health
clinics? Worse yet, was I such a brainwashed underling that it
simply had not occurred to me that I had the right to demand
which doctor I saw? How did this fit in with the Nordic ideals
of personal autonomy, individualism, and independence, and
with the Nordic theory of love? Perhaps I should celebrate the
ability to choose my doctor in America, and see what this newfound freedom was all about.
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It turned out to be more complicated than I had expected.
Soon enough I was lost in the mysterious maze of physicians,
clinics, and hospitals throughout New York City, desperately
asking friends for recommendations, calling various offices
only to learn that they didn’t take my insurance or didn’t take
new patients. Over the next several years, as Trevor’s employer
changed insurance companies, or Trevor changed jobs, we were
frequently forced to leave whatever doctor we’d been using.
Every time, we pored over plans, costs, doctor reviews, and paperwork. Choosing a doctor became an exhausting burden that
yielded few, if any, benefits. Many Americans may be fortunate
enough to have found a good doctor they like, and fortunate
enough to live a settled-­enough existence that they can build a
relationship of trust with that doctor over time. But that is often
not the way it goes.
When I lived in Finland, who my doctor was hadn’t much
mattered to me because all the doctors I encountered in the
public health-­care system struck me as quite good. However,
let’s say I had wanted to choose a particular doctor at the public
clinic, and to see that same doctor every time. Over the past
decade it has become much easier to choose your own doctor
even in the public system. Norway and Denmark have already
opted for the British model, in which primary care physicians
are private providers, but the taxpayers foot the bill for everyone’s visits. Patients can choose any doctor they want to sign up
with, and doctors get paid partly based on the number of patients on their rosters, and partly on actual visits. Hospital care
is still mostly a public ser­vice, and a referral from the primary
care physician is usually needed for visits to a specialist. That
said, many Danes have additional private insurance offered by
their employer, which gives them other options. In Sweden patients can also choose their primary care physicians, whether
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private or public, and the taxpayer money follows them where
they want to go.
In Finland options to see private doctors who are partly subsidized either by the government or by employers have existed
for a long time. Today Finns can also choose their public doctors,
health clinics, and hospitals freely, with only some limitations—­
for example, you can switch which public clinic you use no more
than once a year, which helps prevent costly administrative
churn in the system. Moreover, there has been talk in Finland of
moving closer to the Swedish model, which would give Finnish
patients even more fully taxpayer-­funded options.
After comparing my experiences with doctors in Finland
and America, I came to this conclusion: In some ways I got
more care in the United States than in Finland. My American insurance typically covered an annual physical exam and
all manner of routine tests that had never been performed on
me in Finland, since no doctor there had ever considered them
necessary. At the same time, having to arrange so many aspects
of health care myself, while also having to navigate the ever-­
changing maze of employers, plans, prices, and the scarcity of
openings with good doctors, I was thrown into a state of constant stress—­and I wasn’t even sick or injured yet. I longed for
a different kind of freedom—­the freedom of knowing that the
Finnish health-­care system was always there for me regardless
of my employment status. I wanted the freedom of knowing
that all the doctors were good and that their goal was whatever was in my best interests, rather than generating profits. I
wanted to know that the system would automatically take me
in and give me excellent care without my having to exhaust
myself with self-­advocacy in my moment of weakness and
need. That was real freedom. So was the freedom of knowing
that none of it would bankrupt me.
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AN AMERICAN IN FINLAND
Everywhere in the world ­people have complaints about their
health-­care system, and even the best-­performing nations still
need improvement. The journalist T. R. Reid, as he describes
traveling the world studying different approaches to health
care, quotes a Prince­
ton policy analyst named Tsung-­
Mei
Cheng. Having observed the difficulties of creating effective
health-­care systems around the globe, Cheng came up with
what she calls her three “Universal Laws of Health Care Systems.” They are as follows: “1. No matter how good the health
care in a particular country, ­people will complain about it. 2. No
matter how much money is spent on health care, the doctors
and hospitals will argue that it is not enough. 3. The last reform
always failed.”
Many Finns consider the Finnish health-­care system a disaster. The health-­care perks that salaried Finns get from their
employers allow them to visit primary care physicians without
any wait. This leaves the unemployed, the self-­employed, or retired Finns to face longer waits at public clinics. In addition private care that is subsidized by the public system has ensured that
Finns with money can buy their way into immediate elective
surgery more quickly than the less well-­off. By American standards the prices of private care in Finland are not outrageous,
but Finns who can afford them do get better access to care than
those who can’t.
An American might think that it is only right to reward
­people for their hard work, and to give ­people incentives to get
a job with benefits, not to mention to earn a salary good enough
to be able to pay for better health care if they want to. In Finland today, however, the fact that such trends might be starting
to emerge is generally considered a disgrace. While there are
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Finns who think a more libertarian and private-­sector approach
would serve Finland better in health care, as in other areas
of life, most Finns believe that their success as a nation in the
twenty-­first century demands that real equality of opportunity
be extended to every member of society no matter what, including in the form of a strong national public health-­care system.
To ensure that access to health care in Finland remains equitable, the Finnish government has instituted rules shortening
the amount of time patients might have to wait before seeing a
doctor. Now all nonemergency cases must be evaluated within
three days of a patient contacting a public health clinic, and
access to a general practitioner or specialist for nonemergency
care must follow no later than ninety days after the initial evaluation. Elective surgery must be scheduled within six months.
Needless to say someone who needs emergency care or is suffering from acute pain can always walk into an emergency room
anywhere in Finland, for a copay of less than forty-­five dollars.
In addition the Finnish government is in the process of pushing
through changes in health-­care administration and funding that
would create a more centralized system, in an effort to improve
both efficiency and equality.
Still, if you’ve grown up with the American health-­care
system, you might wonder why any American would go to all
the trouble to think about having a Nordic-­style system instead.
Maybe the devil you know is better than the devil you don’t?
That’s what Pamela might well have thought, until she was
diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
The hour-­and-­a-­half drive from Helsinki to Lammi, a Finnish town of about five thousand ­people, runs on roads winding
through farmland and past bright-­red barns. On a crisp October day, the fields were covered by a thin layer of frost, and
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the low-lying sun shone brightly on the yellows and greens of
autumn. When I arrived in Lammi I rang the bell of an apartment at the end of a small row of houses, and a forty-­nine-­year-­
old American from Alabama named Pamela opened the door.
Pamela is a chatty brunette with bright eyes and an easy
laugh, and much affection for her white-­and-­black cat, Yoda, as
well as her big blue-­and-­yellow parrot, Sibelius—­named after
the famous Finnish composer. The pets kept us company while
we talked.
The story of how Pamela got to this small town in rural Finland started decades ago in Altamonte Springs, Florida, where
she was working her first waitressing job. One night a Finnish
student came in with a friend, and soon enough Pamela and
the student started dating. They got married and lived in the
United States for two decades, with Pamela working an office
job in a hospital in Birmingham, Alabama. When her husband
was offered a job back home, they moved to Finland. When I
met her she had been living in Finland for five years, but now
she and her husband were both struggling to find permanent
employment. The company her husband had first worked for in
Finland had since gone out of business. They were thinking of
moving back to the United States, but there was an obstacle—­
Pamela had recently been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
Unlike in the United States, the fact that she and her husband were both currently out of steady work didn’t mean they
had no health-­care coverage. As soon as Pamela was diagnosed
she was taken in by Finland’s public health-­care system. When
I met with her the Affordable Care Act was about to take effect
back in the States. Encouraged, Pamela had researched options
for individual insurance plans offered by the new health exchanges, but she couldn’t figure out if she could sign up before
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she knew which state they might settle in, or how the tax subsidies would work in her case. With her illness, she couldn’t risk
being without health insurance for extended periods of time.
In Finland none of that was an issue. Her coverage was close
to 100 percent, and it did not depend on employment or where
she lived. She paid copays of forty dollars here, twenty dollars
there, but the low annual caps that apply to all Finns applied to
her as well. She was seeing a neurologist, an ophthalmologist, a
urologist, a nurse, and a physical therapist, as well as attending
subsidized exercise classes. Getting appointments sometimes
took longer than she would have liked, but mostly she was
happy with her care. “I’ve been to see lots of ­people. I feel like
I’ve been taken care of,” Pamela told me. Rummaging through
her kitchen drawers, she dug out a cheese slicer with a special
handle designed for p­ eople who’d lost strength in their fingers.
Pamela waved it gleefully in the air. “The occupational therapist gave me this, and a cool knife, and scissors, and a chair to sit
on in the shower,” she explained, “and I didn’t pay for any of it.”
Having worked in an American hospital herself, and having
had her share of health issues even before the MS diagnosis,
Pamela had considerable experience with the health-­care system
in America. Her stories of the twists and turns she experienced in
dealing with American health insurance and hospitals unwind
like many an American health-­care tale—­with so many actors,
phases, and hurdles that keeping track is hard even for the protagonist. Based on her experiences, she has deemed Finnish hospital care top-­notch. One time in Finland she stayed alone in a
hospital room meant for two ­people, with minimal cost to her.
“I was there for five nights, had excellent care, two ambulance
rides, X-­rays, CAT scans, follow-­up visits, and the whole thing
ended up costing me three hundred dollars,” she related, still
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astonished. Similar care she had received in American hospitals
had seemed just as good to her, but came—­as usual—­with a
much higher price tag and far more hassle and stress.
When Americans imagine a hospital in a public health-­care
system, they often envision something out of the former Soviet
Union—­a barren, gray, old facility with lazy staff, dirty sinks,
and lack of adequate equipment. The decor of Finnish hospitals
actually did strike Pamela as somewhat sparse and utilitarian,
with the chairs lined up in the hallways next to the appointment
rooms, instead of having general waiting areas, and without the
customary buzz of American hospitals with their volunteers,
chapels, and gift shops. Visiting a rather sad-­looking gift shop
in a Finnish hospital, Pamela immediately envisioned how she
could spruce it up, and her American can-­do spirit bubbled up:
“I thought, I wanna whip you guys into shape!”
Squandered gift-­shop opportunities aside, Pamela would
like to correct some of the misconceptions about public health
care that she feels her fellow Americans have. Finnish hospitals are just as clean and modern as American ones, sometimes
even more so. But what about the latest medical innovations?
Didn’t she think she might get better, more cutting-­edge care
if she were to move back to the United States? No, Pamela replied, she didn’t think she was missing out. And she had something with which to compare her Finnish care—­her sister in the
United States has MS too. Imagining herself back in the States,
Pamela mused: “I’d be getting more cutting-­edge care than in
Bangladesh, yes, but not more than in Finland.”
Later I encountered another American in Finland married
to a Finn, and this American was also suffering from MS. Michele’s experiences were very similar to Pamela’s. But her disease
had already progressed so far that she required expensive medications that Pamela did not yet need. In the United States drugs
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for MS are much more expensive than in many other countries;
when she lived in the United States Michele was paying six hundred dollars in copays every year for one drug she needed, even
with her insurance. When I chatted with her, I sitting in Brooklyn and she in Finland, she had just been to a pharmacy to fill
a prescription for the same drug. In Finland, she told me, the
drug was costing her the equivalent of fourteen dollars a year.
(This was before the Finnish government set a new annual deductible for all prescription drugs—fifty-five dollars in 2016.)
Pamela missed her friends and family back in the United
States, and reminisced about many aspects of American life
that were easier for her—­abundant parking, big grocery stores,
a bigger house, cities designed for p­ eople who have difficulty
moving. But as far as she was concerned, the quality of the medical care in both places is fine. For her it is all about being able
to afford that care.
Pamela’s case can be considered somewhat unusual, of
course, in the sense that she happened to develop such a serious,
long-­term condition. But even when ­people don’t, there is one
ailment that no one can escape.
AG I N G W E L L
The hope for all of us in the twenty-­first century is that we survive to a healthy old age, and lead independent lives, passing our
days as we would like and giving our affection and attention
to our loved ones without strings attached. The Nordic healthcare system helps make this hope a reality, while the American
health-care system often shackles p­ eople instead into relationships of dependency.
In the United States, Medicare helps those aged sixty-­five
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or older pay for their health-­care needs. But there are some
enormous holes in long-­term elder care that Medicare doesn’t
­cover—­in fact some of the biggest expenses of all: room and
board in nursing homes or assisted-­living facilities; twenty-­four-­
hour nurse ser­vices; home health aides who deliver meals, help
bathe the elderly, get groceries, and clean the house. In America
the cost for all such ser­vices simply falls on the elderly themselves,
until they’ve exhausted most of their assets and are destitute.
To pay for all this yourself, the conventional wisdom in the
United States is that you need to have saved at least a million
dollars before you can retire. Unfortunately most Americans are
nowhere close to meeting the minimums they need. Based on a
2013 estimate, the median financial net worth of an American
household headed by someone nearing retirement—­aged fifty-­
five to sixty-­four—­was, excluding homes and cars, not much over
sixty thousand dollars. Meanwhile, in 2013 the median annual
cost for a private nursing-­home room in the United States was
more than eighty thousand dollars. If an American completely
runs out of money in old age, Medicaid—­the state-­run program
for the poor—­will probably kick in, but it will often require relocation to a nursing facility of questionable quality. Some states
have also been cutting their Medicaid funding and changing
eligibility requirements, leaving ­people who once relied on the
program to their own devices. Considering all this, perhaps it’s
no surprise that several studies have identified running out of
money in retirement as one of the most pervasive fears among
large swaths of the American public, even among the wealthy.
Since many elderly Americans cannot possibly pay for all the
ser­vices they need, their grown children end up taking care of
them—­not just helping to pay their bills but literally becoming
their nurses and home health aides, as well as their health-­care
coordinators and advocates. This, of course, is on top of the bur-
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dens these grown children are already shouldering—­trying to
take care of their own kids, managing their own family’s health
care, and paying their own bills. This requires adults and their
elderly parents to negotiate a profound, intensely personal, and
often discomfiting new role reversal, in which parents who have
grown accustomed to their autonomy become dependent, sometimes painfully so, on their own children. Sometimes these new
relationships between older parents and their offspring become
a wonderful opportunity for renewed emotional connection.
The reality of life in the United States, however, tends to be that
younger families with kids are already stretched terribly thin,
struggling to make ends meet in terms of both money and time.
While they might be more than happy to spend some weekends
and holidays with their elderly parents, taking care of them and
paying their bills is an entirely different matter.
As I observed the lives of my American acquaintances and
relatives, I was dumbfounded to learn that it was perfectly
common for ­people with careers and children to take turns with
their own siblings doing elder-­care duty. Others were paying
thousands of dollars each month to help their parents cope, and
some women in the prime of their working years were dropping out of the workforce and giving up their careers in order
to care for aging family members.
These sorts of arrangements might not come as a surprise in
a traditional society where, for example, daughters-­in-­law might
be expected to cook three meals a day for a three-­generation
household and wait on their husbands’ parents hand and foot.
But that’s not the society that most p­ eople in the modern West
aspire to in the twenty-­first century.
Nordic families love their aging parents as much as those
anywhere in the world. That’s exactly why they want their love
for the elderly to remain untainted by the sort of resentments
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that can arise when aging parents are stuck in relationships of
dependency with their own children—­relationships that destroy the autonomy, independence, and freedom of everyone
involved.
The Nordic countries are among the nations around the
world whose populations are aging the fastest. Many aging societies across the globe still expect children to help pay for their elderly parents’ care, but the Nordic nations, informed by a view
of contemporary life that draws on the Nordic theory of love,
are not among them. They believe that it makes more sense in
this day and age for society to provide complete elder care as
a basic social ser­vice. This in turn allows families to enjoy one
another’s company, unencumbered. It also ensures the dignity
and well-­being of every individual, regardless of his or her personal wealth—­and regardless of the not-­insignificant question
of whether or not he or she happens to get along with every
member of their family. Just as Nordic societies believe that children should not be left at the complete mercy of their parents,
they also believe that parents should not be left at the mercy of
their children.
Because of this philosophy the Nordic countries have arranged elder care largely the same way they’ve arranged public
health care, as a fundamental government ser­vice that is paid
for through taxes and that is available to everyone. A chief goal
is to help aging citizens remain in their own homes for as long
as possible, with municipalities supporting them by providing
home health aides, food delivery, housecleaning, and shopping
ser­vices either for free or at an affordable price. When the elderly do move into nursing homes or assisted living, the cost is
partly covered by contributions from each resident’s own pension or retirement income—­to the extent that such income is
available. But there is also a reasonable cap on these contribu-
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tions, allowing each resident to preserve some financial independence as well. The rest is funded by the public system. As a
result the assets of nursing-­home residents are not touched, nor
will their children be charged. Tellingly, many of my acquaintances in the Nordic countries—­including those who see their
elderly relatives quite frequently—­remain unfamiliar with the
details of their care and its costs. Much of it is arranged directly
by municipalities, so there’s no need for other family members
to get involved in managing the logistics.
It must be stated, though, that Nordic elderly care—­and
Finnish elderly care in particular—­has many problems. The
quality and costs of such care are debated constantly, and the
Nordic media have exposed poor practices in both privately
and publicly operated nursing homes. Finnish politicians have
begun to suggest that as the population continues to age, wealthy
baby boomers can’t continue to expect to get their care fully covered. In addition the Finnish eagerness to help the elderly live
in their homes as long as possible has lately led to accusations
that even those who cannot cope at home anymore are having
trouble getting into nursing homes. Despite these issues, international studies have consistently found the Nordic countries,
particularly Norway and Sweden, to be some of the best places
on earth in which to grow old.
As with Nordic health care more generally, there is a fair
amount of choice for the elderly. They can choose to pay for
private ser­vices themselves, or to live in private assisted-­living
facilities. And many grown children do spend countless hours
helping their aging parents. But instead of paying for and
­arranging the care from scratch, their burden consists of discussing the best solutions available with their parents and the
municipal caretakers. In cases where family members prefer to
care for their own relatives, the state will fill in where necessary.
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For example, municipalities can provide a home health aide
who might take over from the family members on weekends
or during a vacation period, to give the main caregiver a break.
Municipalities will also often pay a family member a stipend
while that person stays home to care for an ailing loved one.
When comparing the American and Nordic approaches to
elder care, it might still sound as if the Nordic approach breaks
families apart by weakening the bonds between family members. However, research suggests that the opposite is true. Tine
Rostgaard, a professor at Aalborg University in Denmark who
specializes in Nordic family policies, explained it to me this way:
“Because we have such a big public provision in place, you could
also say that ­people dare to go in to give informal care because
it’s realistic for them. It’s not too time consuming, and they don’t
stand alone with the biggest care tasks.”
In other words, Rostgaard continued, having a public
system that will take care of the fundamentals, and the most
difficult aspects of care, actually frees up family members to
provide truly loving care for their aging relatives in ways, and
amounts, that are not overly taxing or exhausting. This leaves
everyone more satisfied, and prevents resentments from poisoning relationships. Again the Nordic approach improves everyone’s quality of life.
E N V I S I O N I N G A H E A LT H Y N AT I O N
When ObamaCare took effect at the beginning of 2014, some
­people in Europe had the impression that America’s health-­care
system had actually been rebuilt. I was chatting in New York
with a friend visiting from Finland, and at the mention of my
health-­care woes, he brushed me off brightly, with impressive
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naïveté: “But now you have ObamaCare!” From the perspective
of Europeans, the state of American health care has been such
a strange anachronism for so long that it’s perfectly reasonable
to assume that it should have been fixed by now. But of course
it hasn’t.
The Affordable Care Act did address some of the problems.
It has extended coverage to millions of Americans, required insurance policies to cover more ­people than before, and put some
limits on insured ­people’s expenses. What the law didn’t do is
make it simple to buy insurance, or address the overall problem
of skyrocketing costs. I happened to be one of those frustrated
­people in America whose deductible and copays shot up after
ObamaCare, even as my out-­of-­pocket maximum went down.
And despite the lower out-­of-­pocket max, ObamaCare did
nothing to ease my fears that if I had serious medical expenses,
no matter which private insurance company I was stuck with, it
would deny half of my claims anyway. As American commentators have pointed out, ObamaCare is a ridiculously complex,
inefficient, annoying, and fundamentally compromised way of
trying to do something simple—­provide health care for all.
Setting aside the political influence of the private health-­
care industry, are there legitimate reasons why the United States
can’t accomplish what most every other wealthy industrialized
nation has done, and create a true public health-­care system?
As far as I can see, there are three main reasons why the
United States arranges most of its health care through employers
and private insurance companies. First, doing so doesn’t require
new taxes. Second, it allows p­ eople to choose for themselves the
insurance plan and doctor they want. And third, many Americans assume that if you allow a number of profit-­driven private
insurance companies and private health-­care providers to compete with one another, it’s good for the consumer.
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The thing is, Americans are already paying for much of
their health care one way or another through taxes. Taxes finance Medicare, Medicaid, and all health care for military
veterans through the VA system. The new subsidies created
by ObamaCare work through tax credits. And even private
employer-­sponsored health care is being supported by taxes.
Contributions to health-­
insurance plans by employers and,
in most cases, by their employees are tax-­free, which in effect
means that employees are actually getting a big chunk of their
compensation before taxes. This exemption makes employer-­
sponsored health care one of the biggest tax breaks in the federal
tax code—­which is to say, it’s public spending in the form of tax
dollars not collected. And as such it’s a terribly inefficient use of
tax dollars, because it directs the biggest benefits to those with
the highest incomes and the most generous health plans. ­People
with lower incomes and less generous plans, and those who are
uninsured altogether, get a much smaller break or none at all.
Overall these policies are a hodgepodge of measures created at
different times that have ended up treating Americans very differently depending on how they get their coverage.
And when it comes to buying and selling health care, when
a buyer in any transaction is desperate—­as most of us are when
we need medical treatment—­the seller has a huge unfair advantage, and this can distort an otherwise rational free market. In
holding on to its private, profit-­driven model, the United States
is way behind the times, and average American citizens are increasingly getting stuck with the enormous price tag for this
completely outdated and unconscionably unfair system.
If a society had limitless funds, constantly running expensive
tests on everyone and paying doctors and health-­industry executives gigantic salaries would not be a problem, as long as the
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treatments were justified for medical reasons, and as long as the
poor didn’t get left behind. After all, that’s what most of us think
of as good medical care—­the more the better. At the same time
the issue is more complex than that. Health spending is growing everywhere in the world as populations age, as expectations
rise, and as new technologies and drugs generate more tests and
treatments for ailments that used to go undetected or untreated.
In a sense no matter how much money a country spends, health
care will always be a bottomless pit. There is always something
more you can do, and indeed, we are doing much more now
than just a few decades or even years ago. But that’s also precisely why a modern nation in the twenty-­first century needs
to ensure that its money is spent wisely—­that society is paying
reasonable amounts for health care that is effective, and that the
criteria for doing so are clear and transparent.
If America’s reckless spending were actually creating incentives that dramatically increased the quality of care, then perhaps
it could be justified. But the experience of the Nordic countries,
along with other advanced societies that have national health
care, shows that this just isn’t the case. The care in the Nordic
countries is equally as good as, or even better than, the care in
the United States.
Because spending on health care in the United States has been
growing much faster than the overall U.S. economy, and much
faster than the family income of most Americans, Americans
can essentially no longer afford it. This is sadly ironic: Futuristic new technologies and drugs are being introduced constantly,
while most Americans are falling backward into a state reminiscent of the distant past, when only the well-­off could afford
medical treatment. As a Commonwealth Fund report explained
in 2015: “In an effort to reduce their own cost of providing
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health insurance, employers have increased the amount that
workers contribute to their premiums and also to their health
care, through higher deductibles and copayments. The result
has been a rapid increase in employees’ out-­of-­pocket costs for
premiums for plans that provide less financial p­ rotection.”
In the decade leading up to 2013, employer-­sponsored insurance premiums rose three times faster than wages. Employees’
premium contributions and deductibles doubled. As a result
Americans are being asked to spend a much bigger part of their
wages on health care than just a decade ago. The system that is
meant to benefit consumers is strangling them, often to within
inches of their lives.
Sadly, many Americans only discover this when they get
sick.
In 2014 a forty-­eight-­year-­old nurse from Austin, Texas, named
Genny was diagnosed with stage III colon cancer. Her doctors
immediately signed her up for a complicated course of treatment that ended up requiring her to be hospitalized for nearly
two months. She underwent radiation and several surgeries,
and after that twelve rounds of chemotherapy. The treatments
were painful, and she endured long periods of excruciating discomfort. The threat of death hung over her and traumatized
her husband and their young daughter. On top of all this was
the nightmare of her health insurance.
When Genny discovered she was sick, she was insured
through her husband’s employer. The insurance company was a
large corporation with a nationwide presence, the coverage had
been good, and over the years the family had diligently monitored their health, getting their teeth cleaned every six months
and taking their daughter for annual checkups, without ever
experiencing any serious problems. Now, as Genny started her
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treatments, everything seemed fine at first. The ­couple paid
out-­of-­pocket copays and other small charges, but the insurance
plan covered most of the costs.
After Genny was discharged from her long hospitalization,
and after her several surgeries, she needed follow-­up care on an
ongoing basis. She still had several open wounds that needed to
heal, as well as a catheter and an intravenous line, and she was
still suffering severe pain. Her husband had already taken time
off to care for her, and had to get back to his out-­of-­town job. No
one in her immediate family was available to help her manage
all this either. So she contacted a home health-­care agency, gave
them her insurance information, and started receiving care.
Three months later her insurance company informed her that
while home care was generally covered, in this case the provider
had failed to get a prior authorization, and the company was
thus refusing to pay for it.
Around the same time Genny started her chemotherapy.
Partway into the months-­long treatment, Genny noticed something odd: The forms from her insurance company were now
stating that she was responsible for fifteen thousand dollars for
each round of chemo. Suddenly—­without warning, it seemed—­
for the past several treatments Genny had been incurring bills
from the oncology center that now totaled some sixty thousand
dollars.
Stunned, Genny put two and two together. A month into
the chemo, her husband’s employer had decided to switch everyone to a different plan with the same insurance company.
Genny and her husband had received a notification of the
change from the employer, but because it was still the same insurance company, and their coverage had always been good,
given everything else they were dealing with they hadn’t gotten
around to checking whether there had been any changes to the
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specific doctors in the new plan. As it turned out, the oncologist
and infusion center Genny had already been using had been in-­
network on the old plan, but not on the new one. No one from
the oncology center had pointed this out to her, and she hadn’t
figured it out herself until after she’d already incurred tens of
thousands of dollars in fees.
Then Genny’s husband was laid off. The ­couple was left
with no income, and now faced losing medical insurance altogether. Her husband’s employer had agreed to keep paying the
premiums for another six months, but after that they’d be on
their own.
When I spoke with Genny, almost a year after the initial
diagnosis, she was nearing the end of her chemotherapy, and
as far as her health went, I was glad to hear that things were
looking up. Her husband had also gotten a new job, and it came
with new health insurance, though from a different company.
But Genny was still struggling to figure things out with the old
insurance company. “Every time I see one of their envelopes in
the mailbox my heart seizes,” she told me.
By now she had received dozens of statements from the insurance company, filled with inexplicable codes and confusing
charges. “Just to give you an idea,” Genny told me, “every chemo
treatment has fourteen or fifteen separate charges. They’re all
for the same dates of ser­vice but they’re different charges that
are covered differently. Frequently they’ll assign duplicate claim
numbers, or they’ll assign different claim numbers for the same
date of ser­vice.” When Genny had the strength, she spent countless hours going through the paperwork, and more countless
hours on the phone trying to deal with the astronomical charges
that had piled up. She shared some of the paperwork with me,
and just looking at it seemed enough to make my head explode.
To avoid any breaks in her care, Genny was now paying the
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oncology center monthly installments, and charging thousands
of dollars’ worth of bills to her credit cards. A patient advocacy group was trying to help her reach some sort of agreement
with the insurance company. She still had no idea how much
she would owe in the end, and she avoided tallying up all the
expenses because it was too devastating. “It’s frustrating, it’s
scary,” she said, “and it seems completely arbitrary what gets
covered and what doesn’t. Nobody knows how much anything
costs, and none of it makes any sense. As if cancer and unemployment weren’t enough.”
Some time after I spoke with her, Genny received both good
and bad news. In response to her appeals the insurance company had finally agreed to treat her provider as if it were in-­
network—­for certain dates. That meant that at least part of her
chemotherapy would be covered after all. But her home care still
wouldn’t be covered. While this freed Genny from some of the
most outrageous bills, she remained exasperated by the whole
ordeal—­and no wonder! This sort of thing is not supposed to
happen to ­people fortunate enough to be living a modern life in
a wealthy nation.
The husband of a close friend of mine in Finland had also been
battling colon cancer. His Finnish doctors in the public health-­
care system did everything they could to save his life, including
a series of complex surgeries, hospitalizations, and chemotherapy over the course of several years. They were blunt with him
about his chances, which were not good, but they never stopped
trying; at one point he even underwent brain surgery at the hands
of Finland’s top neurosurgeon, who is a legendary specialist with
an international reputation. When needed, the municipality sent
health aides to care for him at home, and toward the end of his life
also paid for his care at a private nonprofit hospice. Even with all
the care he received, his approaching death and the exhaustion of
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enduring the operations and chemotherapy were devastating to
him, to his wife, and to his two young children.
In his case the family’s finances were also a concern. Although
my friend—­his wife—­works, he himself was able to work only
intermittently after his diagnosis. After they did the math, however, they realized that they could still cobble together enough
income from her earnings, his salary when he could work, and
from the cash benefits the Finnish public system sent them to
continue to afford the middle-­class lifestyle they’d previously
paid for with two incomes. Never once did they have to worry
about being left with huge medical bills.
Instead they could focus their energy on cherishing every
additional day that the treatments brought, and on loving each
other while he was still alive.
The experience of Nordic health care suggests that there is actually no good reason the United States can’t switch to a similar approach, and offer high-­quality care for less cost. Universal
public health care could begin in a variety of ways. The federal government or state governments could operate public
insurance plans on the new health exchanges. Such “Medicare-­
for-­all” plans could offer a transparent, fair benefit package to
anyone who wanted to buy it, and as these plans grew in participation, they could negotiate better and better prices with providers. This idea is not new. In fact, a public option has been
proposed in the United States many times, notably during the
early stages of the Affordable Care Act. Several polls have indicated that a half or even a majority of Americans are in favor of
creating just such an option.
Some states and counties are already taking matters into
their own hands. Vermont, for example, has been preparing to
move to a Canadian-­style single-­payer option. The most recent
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plan was to create publicly funded insurance that would offer
coverage to all residents starting in 2017, but a few years before
the deadline Vermont’s governor announced he was abandoning
the plan for the time being due to cost concerns. Bills to advance
similar plans have been introduced in several states, including
Massachusetts and Ohio. Some counties in California are continuing efforts to create public plans or expand the functions of
existing ones. Having every state create its own system is messier and more complicated than having the federal government
offer public health insurance for all, but in Canada, for example,
public health insurance is arranged by the provinces. Similarly,
a variety of efforts by American states could hasten change and
serve as a laboratory for nationwide reform.
What else could the United States do in the short term?
The fact that the United States still does not regulate the prices
of most medical treatments and drugs, or consider their effectiveness when determining coverage, is starting to look like a
major national embarrassment. Today many nations continue
to base their health-­care systems on private providers and private insurers, but they set rates just as they do for any other
public u
­ tility—­as they would for an electricity company, for
­example—­or they negotiate fees and basic benefit packages
with providers and insurers. In Europe, where prices are regulated, American pharmaceutical companies still happily sell
products, clearly deeming that business to be worthwhile. Drug
­companies warn, of course, that if their profits in the United
States were curtailed it would reduce their ability to innovate,
but the research and development costs of major American drug
companies are but a fraction of their vast profits. Drug companies spend much more on advertising than on product development. As it happens, the United States is also one of the few
countries that allows advertising of prescription drugs directly
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to ­consumers. As Steven Brill noted in his exposé for Time, there
is no reason Americans should be subsidizing these companies
with higher prices than in the rest of the world.
There are many ways to change the current American
system. President Obama asked Congress to let Medicare officials negotiate prices with drug manufacturers, an utterly sensible practice that is, astonishingly, forbidden by current law.
Several states have considered bills that would require drug
companies to report their costs and justify their prices to public
agencies. With costs continuing to skyrocket, the United States
actually has no choice but to catch up sooner or later with the
rest of the advanced world on cost control, and these measures
could be a start.
The benefits of bringing public health care and more regulated
health care to America would likely be huge. For employers,
universal coverage would level the playing field and make everyone more competitive, at home and abroad. Currently U.S.
employers that offer their employees health insurance, like those
that offer parental leaves, are at a disadvantage compared with
those who don’t. They’re also at a disadvantage when competing with companies in other countries with public health care.
Many American employers have already hinted that they’d be
more than happy to drop the burden of providing health insurance and instead offer their employees higher wages, or support
for purchasing their own health insurance. ObamaCare forced
big employers to keep offering health insurance, whereas a
public option would free both employers and employees from
the absurdity of health care that’s tied to employment.
For doctors a more unified public system with set prices and
clearly defined benefit packages would make their work easier.
They wouldn’t have to spend time figuring out what their pa-
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tients’ different insurance arrangements cover or don’t cover,
and they could be relieved of much of the paperwork that results
from dealing with a multitude of companies and plans. While
Nordic doctors complain about having to deal with bureaucracy and not getting paid enough, I’ve never seen them work
the kind of factory line that several of my American primary
care physicians and dentists do. Nurses and dental hygienists
do most of the work while the doctor or dentist pops his or her
head into room after room for a few minutes each, keeping up
the pace in order to pay all the administrative assistants needed
to handle all the insurance claims.
For individual Americans public health care would
bring tremendous improvements in freedom, autonomy, and
independence—­freedom from employers, freedom from unhealthy dependencies within families, and freedom from countless hours spent arranging health care and figuring out how to
pay for it. In a nation that purports to champion freedom, the
outdated disaster that is the U.S. health-­care system is taking
that freedom away. But that’s not all. There’s another casualty
of this system: community.
During a Republican presidential debate in 2011, Representative Ron Paul, a physician as well as a famous libertarian who
at the time was running for president, was asked who should
foot the bill if a healthy thirty-­year-­old man with a good job had
chosen not to buy health insurance but had suddenly gone into
a coma and required six months of intensive care. “That’s what
freedom is all about,” Paul responded, “taking your own risks.”
The host of the debate, CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, sought clarification: Should society really just let the man die? This time it was
members of the audience who responded for Paul, shouting out
an enthusiastic “Yeah!”
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When I first heard about Paul’s audience’s “just let him die”
approach I was outraged. How could any civilized human being
think that way? A few years later I understood how. After I had
been paying for insurance for a few years while constantly teetering on the brink of personal financial insecurity, I happened
upon an article about a self-­employed man who could have afforded to pay for health insurance but hadn’t, only to find himself later suffering from advanced prostate cancer; ironically,
the cancer had not been detected earlier because he had avoided
doctors for fear of the costs. He confessed in the article that he
had been an idiot, and expressed profound gratitude for the hospital that treated him and forgave most of his bills, which had
already reached half a million dollars.
Just like that, I found myself empathizing with Ron Paul’s
audience. Unpaid medical bills fall either on taxpayers, as government money flows in to subsidize hospitals that provide
charity care, or they fall on other individuals, when hospitals
raise their prices to cover their losses, and when insurance companies raise their premiums to cover those higher prices. That
man had made his choice. Why should I have to bail him out?
In Finland I had never felt that way. The current system in the
United States, even though we may not notice it, isn’t just bad in
terms of getting health care; it also literally tears apart the social
fabric of the nation.
A health-­care system funded through progressive income
taxes ensures that everyone contributes according to ability. It
also makes health-­care decisions part of the nation’s democracy
and gives ­people ownership of the system. If the government
were to raise taxes significantly to pay for health-­care costs
without improving care, ­people would be up in arms. But if a
private insurance company raises its prices dramatically every
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year, p­ eople grumble but mostly can do nothing about it. And
in America it happens all the time.
As I interviewed Nordic citizens about their health care, I
was struck by how understanding they were of the need to keep
costs at bay and to offer care to the neediest cases. Since they
felt they were paying for a system that aims to treat patients
fairly, they seemed to embrace the need to be responsible in their
own demands as well. In the United States the prevailing feeling seems quite the opposite: that insurance companies are the
enemies of common ­people, and thus should be squeezed out
of every penny possible. One health-­care researcher described
a focus group of ordinary Americans in her study as having an
“almost vengeful” attitude toward insurance companies, and a
clear determination to go for the most expensive care that their
insurance would pay for. If you feel the system is treating you
unfairly, you feel no need to be fair in return.
It is difficult for Americans to realize what they’re missing.
Europeans can feel enormously proud of and even patriotic
about their health-­care systems because they pay for them with
their taxes, and they genuinely feel that the system has been
created by them and for them. If the system is not working,
they are fierce in their criticism and their demands for change.
Success in creating an excellent public health-­care system is
on a par with any other great national achievement, whether
winning Olympic gold medals or landing a man on the moon.
Such pride is within reach—­especially since public health care
actually seems to be what a majority of Americans, particularly
the younger generations, want for themselves. According to the
Pew Research Center, more than half of millennials believe it is
the federal government’s responsibility to make sure all Americans have health coverage. There is no reason a country as great
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as the United States cannot achieve this. Even Burkina Faso has
since passed a tentative law on univeral health coverage.
These differences between nations remind me of an Internet meme that made fun of the premise of the hugely popular
American TV show Breaking Bad. The story begins when the
main character, a high school chemistry teacher named Walter
White, discovers that he has cancer, but that his insurance won’t
pay for his treatment. Needing one hundred thousand dollars
for his care, Walt hatches a plan to make money—­by cooking
crystal meth. The joke making the rounds online depicted how
the TV show would go in a country with universal health care.
Walt and his Canadian doctor are pictured as the doctor delivers the news:
“You have cancer. Treatment starts next week.”
The end.
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SIX
OF US, BY US,
AND FOR US
GO AHEAD:
A S K W H AT YO U R C O U N T R Y
C A N D O F O R YO U
W E L FA R E O R W E L L- B
­ EING?
Before I arrived in the United States I had never heard of “big
government.” I know—­someone from one of those “socialist”
European countries where government arranges everything
from child care to education to health care who doesn’t know
what big government is?! But it gets even weirder. I’d also never
heard of the “welfare state,” a term that makes most Americans
recoil in horror. A welfare state, I learned, is in the business of
producing “welfare queens,” p­ eople who survive in a state of
unhealthy dependency, living off other p­ eople’s work and never
bothering to do any themselves. According to Mitt Romney,
who was caught on camera in an unguarded moment during
the 2012 presidential campaign, the portion of the American
population that apparently fit this description was a staggering
47 percent. Another symbol of all this deprivation often seemed
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to be food stamps. During the Republican presidential primary,
Newt Gingrich was apparently only expressing a commonly
held view when he offered to speak to an African American
association on the theme: Demand paychecks, not food stamps.
Romney, meanwhile, took the idea a little further in a critique of President Obama that seemed to question whether
Obama was truly American. The United States, Romney said
during one of the primary debates, had a president who “wants
us to turn into a European-­style welfare state and have government take from some to give to others.” Romney went on:
“That will kill the ability of America to provide for a prosperous
future, to secure our freedom, and to give us the rights which
have been in our Declaration of Independence and our Constitution. I believe in an America that’s based upon opportunity
and freedom, not President Obama’s social welfare state.” Such
comments were mystifying to me, and only after a while did I
begin to understand that in the United States the term “welfare”
refers to the idea of being on welfare—­in other words, being
poor, without a job, and becoming a burden to society.
By comparison, in my own language of Finnish—­which,
let me warn you, is a crazy-­looking language when it’s written down—­the closest thing we have to the term “welfare state”
would be the term hyvinvointivaltio. Literally, however, this
term means “well-­being state.” To be on welfare would be expressed with entirely different words, such as to “get support for
getting by” (more fun in Finnish: this would be written as saada
toimeentulotukea). In 2013 the proportion of the Finnish population that received this benefit of last resort was only 7 percent.
The programs are not entirely comparable, but by contrast, in
2013 the proportion of Americans who received some form of
food stamps was more than double this, at 15 percent. In Fin-
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land, meanwhile, a larger share of the working-­age population
was actually employed than in the United States. On the basis of
these percentages, it’s a bit difficult to tell which country here is
actually the “welfare state.”
For a Nordic citizen, then, what we call a well-­being state
doesn’t bring to mind things like getting free money without
working. Our well-­being state is there to make sure that citizens,
all citizens, have equal opportunities for well-­being—­to pursue
happiness, enjoy freedom, and achieve success. An overwhelmingly positive reference, it is not something that is handed down
by “big government.” It is something that we attain for ourselves through our own efforts—­and through paying our taxes.
Talk of taxes, of course, immediately strikes terror in the
hearts of most Americans, because European tax rates are supposed to be so much higher than in the United States, especially
in the Nordic countries. Let’s look at that. During the last year
that I lived in Finland and worked a regular full-­time job, as a
magazine editor, I made the equivalent of $67,130—­well above
the median Finnish salary. After some standard deductions my
taxable income was $61,990. So how much did I pay in taxes?
The figure came to $18,973 in national and municipal taxes, or
30.6 percent.
Before drawing a conclusion about that figure, keep in mind
that I didn’t have much else to pay beyond that. For example,
property taxes in Finland have a much smaller impact than in
the United States. Here are some of the things that paying my
Finnish taxes bought me: smoothly functioning and comprehensive health insurance, a full year of partially paid disability
leave, nearly a full year of paid parental leave for each child and
a smaller monthly benefit for an additional two years (should I
or the father of my child choose to stay at home longer with our
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child), affordable high-­quality day care, one of the world’s best
K–12 education systems, free college, and free graduate school.
My taxes in Finland were not used to hand out money to some
lazy moochers living on welfare; instead they were used to pay
for high-­quality ser­vices for me. As far as I was concerned, it
was a bargain.
And here’s the secret of this system: This is the bargain that
everyone in a Nordic country gets, so the system is clearly in
everyone’s self-­interest. Unlike in some bogeyman welfare state,
participation in a well-­being state does not require you to bow
in submission before the altar of altruism, sacrificing your own
advancement to help the unlucky. It supports your own personal
freedom, your own autonomy, and each individual’s ability to
determine his or her own fate, since we don’t need to depend on
the financial largesse of parents, spouses, or employers for the
fundamental ser­vices—­health care, education, and aid during
times of crisis—­that each of us requires to fulfill our potential.
On top of that there’s a less tangible benefit: the pride and satisfaction of participating in a society that truly enables equality of
opportunity for all.
While Americans tend to see their government and the ser­
vices it provides as something separate from them, and often
opposed to them, Nordic p­ eople see the government and its ser­
vices as their own creation. The well-­being state is from each of
us, to each of us, for each of us, and by each of us. Even though
Finns constantly debate how the well-­being state can work best,
­people stick with it because they can see that on the whole, they
come out ahead—­not just as a group but also as individuals.
­People who are well off join the pact not out of unselfish desire
to help those who are less fortunate, but out of a desire to make
life even better for themselves and their immediate friends, colleagues, and families.
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From a Nordic perspective, citizens of the United States
have actually made similar choices, particularly about how to
maintain aspects of a social safety net, yet many Americans seem
unaware of having signed on for them.
In early 2012 the New York Times investigated a mysterious phenomenon. In U.S. states where citizens were clearly benefiting
from government programs, voters supported Republican candidates who, for the most part, promised to reduce government
spending. One might conclude that it was the wealthy residents
of those states who were opposed to government spending, precisely because they didn’t want to support freeloaders. But in
fact it was the very ­people whose lives were being improved by
government spending who were voting to remove it.
When the reporters interviewed low-­income residents of
Chisago County in Minnesota, many interviewees said they
were angry. Why? Because the government was wasting money
and giving it to p­ eople who didn’t deserve it. Even though these
were many of the same ­people who were actually getting the
money through programs such as Medicare, Social Security, and
free school lunches for their children. They seemed to resent
their own dependence on government, yet didn’t know how
they could get by without it.
What is the real problem for the residents of Chisago?
Americans have the idea that government benefits are only for
the poor and the lazy, even though the reality has changed dramatically. Back in 1979, more than half of all government benefits—­54 percent—­were going to households in the bottom 20
percent of the income scale. By 2007, however, that share had
declined to 34 percent. Today the ­people whom the American
government is helping the most are members of the middle class.
Why does the American middle class need so much help?
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Over the same twenty-­eight years, the after-­tax income of the
highest-­earning 1 percent of Americans grew 275 percent.The
same figure for the middle class was only 37 percent. For the
bottom 20 gains were even scantier at 18 percent. It is no wonder
that many hardworking Americans can no longer make ends
meet. What’s worse, however, is that despite this entrenched inequality, middle-­class Americans, working ­people, and the poor
are still told that America is an equal-­opportunity society. As a
result they are made to feel guilty that they need government
involvement to stay afloat.
In the self-­portrait that America paints, society is perceived
as fair and just, and a failure to make it on your own is shameful, but in reality the cards are stacked against the poor and
the middle class. The result is a system everyone hates. A lot
of money is spent supporting the middle class, but the stigma
associated with that support makes it hard to appreciate, or
even acknowledge, what’s being provided. Instead ­people understandably resent the system and the support, because society
makes you feel ashamed about it. The only way out is to vote
against it, even though that ends up being a vote against policies that have actually been helping the person who’s casting the
vote.
To make matters worse, Americans have perfected the
questionable art of what Suzanne Mettler, a professor at Cornell University, calls “the submerged state”—­making government policies invisible by administering them through private
companies, or through the tax code, instead of just sending recipients government checks. In reality tax deductions, credits,
and exemptions are government support for specific groups of
­people, in the form of tax dollars not collected, just as cash benefits are. However, many p­ eople don’t perceive or acknowledge
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that reality, and wrongly assume that they’re not benefiting
from the government at all, even when they are. Taxes in America are extraordinarily and unusually complicated, and very few
­people are capable of truly understanding them and grasping
how much each break has helped them in real dollars—­not to
mention that many Americans pay professionals to file their
taxes, putting even more space between them and the details of
the accounting.
These perception problems are exacerbated by the fact that
­people tend to consider taxes as money taken from them, and
tax breaks as a rightful, if inadequate, correction of the situation. Cash benefits, by contrast, are seen as money received.
There is no difference in reality, but the difference in perception is enormous. Consider an example from Finland: When the
Finnish government sends every single Finnish family in the
country a payment of more than a hundred dollars every month
for each child, the families are clearly aware of the support they
are receiving. But when the United States offers families with
children the Earned Income Tax Credit—­if they qualify—­or
the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit, many recipients fail
to understand that they are receiving a direct cash benefit from
the government.
This sort of misunderstanding is pervasive in America. In
a study Suzanne Mettler asked 1,400 Americans whether they
had used a government social program. Fifty-­seven percent said
they had not. Then she asked if they had used one of twenty-­
one specific federal policies, including child-­care tax credits, the
Earned Income Tax Credit, employer-­sponsored and thus tax-­
exempted health insurance, Medicare, Social Security, unemployment insurance, mortgage-­interest deductions, and student
loans. It turned out that 96 percent of those who had denied
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using government programs had in fact used at least one, and
the average responder had used four. This clear disconnect between Americans’ perception of who benefits from government
programs and the reality makes it easier to keep demonizing the
“welfare state.”
In the Nordic countries, citizens know much more clearly
what it is they are paying their taxes for. That translates into a
clearer notion of why they have a government in the first place,
and what the government’s job is. In Finland when I went to the
doctor at a public health-­care center, I never felt I was receiving a benefit from the government that I hadn’t earned. On the
contrary, I had paid for it in the course of filing my taxes, and
I also knew that if I became seriously ill, I would have earned
the right to be treated by the system at virtually no additional
cost to me, because my taxes had chipped in to help pay for the
care of others. It was the very universality of the public health-­
insurance program that made it so fair and so positive for me.
In other areas of life as well, Nordic policies are designed and
executed for the explicit universal goal of creating a society of
well-­being for everyone. I have never felt ashamed about participating in a system that so clearly creates equity—­and, crucially,
that so clearly lets ­people succeed on their own merits as a result.
This makes the American critique of the supposed horrors
of the European model strange. From a Nordic point of view,
it’s the current American approach that creates relationships
of dependency. In Finland the goal is not to subsidize certain
­people or groups, but to equalize the basic support structure
across the broad expanse of society. By comparison, many of the
most visible American programs as they exist today look surprisingly targeted, selective, and, in many cases, stigmatizing—­
Medicare for the elderly, for example, or food stamps, school
lunches, and Medicaid for the poor (now including many in the
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former middle class). Meanwhile childless young ­people and the
reasonably well-­off get few advantages out of the bargain at all,
and when they do, they fail to see it. And then the very rich get
tons of advantages—­namely all the loopholes the tax code provides them to avoid paying taxes.
Contrary to American criticisms, the Nordic approach has
also turned out to be good not only for most citizens, but for the
entire economy.
Typically, American commentators and politicians dismiss the
European approach as a whole by arguing that European nations are headed straight for bankruptcy. I want to address this
criticism, but to do so I need to get a little bit technical for a few
pages.
To be sure, the recent eurozone crisis that crippled the economies of Greece, Portugal, Spain, and other countries was devastating, and many European governments are certainly going
to have to rethink their generosity to certain sectors of society—­as well as the culture of tax evasion in some of their countries. Yet the three Scandinavian nations—­Denmark, Sweden,
and Norway (none of which are members of the eurozone)—­
came through both the global financial crisis and the European
crisis in better shape than many of their peers. Iceland has had
its troubles, but those were not created by bloated government
benefits; the problems were caused by a lack of oversight for
Iceland’s privatized, deregulated, and—­
as it turned out—­
irresponsible banks, as well as mistakes in monetary policy.
Apart from Iceland, none of the Nordic countries was felled by
the global banking crisis.
Nordic economies go through cycles like all countries, and
they make mistakes like everyone else. In the 1980s and 1990s
they suffered debilitating recessions, thanks largely to blunders
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in the deregulation of financial markets. In Finland’s case the
collapse of the Soviet Union next door was also a factor. Later,
as the euro crisis dragged on, Finland, which is a member of the
eurozone, felt its effects.
On the whole, however, in the midst of the global financial crisis and a European meltdown, the Nordic region actually remained a haven of economic dynamism, freedom, and
stability. With its strong foundation of basic ser­vices, the region
has continued to generate highly educated workers, technologically advanced companies, and low barriers to trade, leaving the
marketplace freer to focus on business. In international rankings of economic competitiveness or freedom, the Nordic countries remain consistently among the best, and even ahead of the
United States.
To the extent that Finland has experienced financial troubles in recent years, have they been the result of too much government spending? Not at all. Rather, reports by international
organizations have cited other reasons: weak demand for exports, Finland’s aging population, loss of market share in the
technology industry (the fall of the cell-­phone giant Nokia),
problems in Finland’s forestry sector, and a relatively rigid labor
market. In addition, some of Finland’s recent economic challenges have been the result of something else entirely: Finland
taking a “hit for the team,” which is to say for all other Western
capitalist democracies, in a standoff against Russia. The United
States and other Western nations had imposed economic sanctions against Russia, to put pressure on Vladimir Putin. Simply
because Finland happens to be next door, Russia was Finland’s
largest trading partner. Finland’s economy suffered as a result
of these sanctions. In addition, there’s the more generic problem
of the euro, the common European currency that, for better or
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worse, Finland adopted in 1999. American economists and experts have pointed out that despite doing everything right in
putting its own financial house in order, Finland has suffered
economic woes simply because, as a eurozone member, it’s not
able to devalue its currency. For sure, Finnish industry needs to
revive itself, but the euro has made recovery that much harder.
As Finnish companies laid off workers and Finland’s finances looked increasingly gloomy, the international praise
heaped upon Finland only a few years earlier did, admittedly,
start to look excessive. Finns themselves debated furiously how
to get back to growth. This debate reflected a discussion under
way all over the world: austerity or stimulus? Overall, Finns
were veering toward austerity and cuts to some benefits, whose
results remain to be seen. Yet these particular economic wobbles were not actually indicators that the Nordic model itself
was in trouble—­as shown by the economic health of the other
Nordic countries, not in the eurozone and with different industrial structures.
Americans tend to assume that the Nordic nations are living
beyond their means, but that’s not the case either. Nordic governments are generally much better at balancing their budgets
than is the United States. In 2014 the American government
had accumulated a debt of more than 100 percent of GDP. Finland owed 70 percent, Denmark 60, Sweden 50, and Norway a
little over 30 percent of GDP. In 2013 the OECD average was
109 percent. Over the past decade all the largest Nordic countries have been running regular budget surpluses. By contrast
the United States has often accrued one of the largest deficits in
the OECD.
The long-­term financial health of the Nordic countries is
also, in the end, a function of the Nordic theory of love. Faced
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with economic downturns or other problems, the Nordic countries have been willing to reform and cut their social programs,
but they have always done so without abandoning the ultimate
goal of supporting individual autonomy and equality of opportunity. By unburdening employers and workers of financial obligations to one another for things that aren’t directly related
to business—­health care being the most obvious one—­workers
are better protected from the risks that accompany economic
change, and companies are freer to operate. Preserving the freedom and independence of individuals this way has proved to
be a good recipe for free-­market dynamism. It’s made workers
flexible and productive.
In addition there’s a surprisingly unsocialist aspect to many
Nordic social benefits: They actually increase the incentive to
work hard. This is because the generosity of many benefits is
tied to an individual’s income. This applies to benefits during
periods of illness and unemployment, as well as to paid parental
leaves and, as you’d expect, retirement benefits. The more you
earn, the more you’ll get while off the job. There are reasonable
limits, of course, but the basic structure of the system provides
a powerful motivation to work hard while you can, so that you
can keep living reasonably comfortably even when you cannot.
This is another reason why even well-­off citizens in the Nordic
countries tend to like the system: It benefits them, too.
Finally, one additional criticism is frequently used to slam
the Nordic approach: Sure, it’s easy for Nordic countries to give
their citizens health care or education, since they are such rich
countries with abundant natural resources and large GDPs.
This misconception is mostly based on the unique situation of
Norway today, which recently became awash in valuable oil and
gas reserves. Finland, by contrast, has no significant natural re-
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sources apart from its forests and some metals. For the most part
the ­people of the Nordic countries have acquired the wealth they
possess today by working for it. They were not rich when they
started building their well-­being states—­even Norway’s oil was
not discovered until the late 1960s.
In other words the Nordic middle class is not getting a free
ride. Nordic citizens themselves pay for the ser­vices they get.
Apart from Norway’s oil and gas, there are no pots of gold
showering Nordic citizens with unearned wealth, and neither
are there evil communists robbing the rich of their due. The
Nordic countries demonstrate that building strong public ser­
vices can create economic growth, and that pooling the risks
everyone faces in life—­sickness, unemployment, old age, the
need to be educated to secure a decent living—­into one system
funded by everyone is more efficient, and more effective, than
each person saving individually to ensure security and survive
misfortune, especially in today’s age of global economic uncertainty and competition.
There is another way of saying this. Americans are right that
big government isn’t the best way to solve problems. The secret
of Nordic success is not big government. It’s smart government.
And as many Americans themselves are already well aware, less
big government, and more smart government, is something the
United States desperately needs.
SMALLER AND SMARTER
After spending some time in America, I could well understand
why many Americans hate anything to do with government.
The post office is a disaster, the tax code is a mess, Amtrak trains
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rarely run on time, the roads are full of potholes, and the DMV
is a nightmare. As Ronald Reagan famously quipped: “The nine
most terrifying words in the English language are: ‘I’m from
the government, and I’m here to help.’ ”
The poor performance of American government ser­vices
is just as shocking to anyone from a Nordic country as it is to
Americans themselves. I watched, bewildered, along with the
rest of the world, as the U.S. Congress failed to agree on funding for government operations back in 2013, and chose instead
to shut down the entire federal government for more than two
weeks, furloughing some eight hundred thousand workers.
Soon after this debacle, I saw a survey indicating that Americans had a higher opinion of root canals, head lice, colonoscopies, and cockroaches than of Congress, and frankly, I’d begun
to understand why.
For many Americans the solution is obvious: Get rid of as
much of the government as possible. Americans draw on powerful political traditions when they argue that government just
creates more problems than it solves. What do we actually need
a government for, anyway?
Close to four hundred years ago the English philosopher
Thomas Hobbes had one kind of answer to that question.
Human beings are naturally in perpetual war against one another, Hobbes wrote in his famous book Leviathan, so therefore
an autocratic ruler and a powerful state—­a state as terrifying
as the biblical monster known as Leviathan—­were necessary
simply to keep p­ eople safe by instituting law and order. Soon
after Hobbes, however, the French philosopher Jean-­Jacques
Rousseau pointed out that while, yes, ­people had to give up
some of their freedoms in exchange for law and order, that
didn’t mean they had to obey a ruler; ­people themselves could
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formulate the laws. Influenced by such ideas, America’s Founding Fathers decreed the United States a democratic republic, a
“government of the ­people, by the ­people, for the ­people,” as
Abraham Lincoln would later so eloquently put it.
So it was that in the late 1700s the United States arrived at
a cutting-­edge notion of what government was for, and what
it should do. While the European nations continued to be governed by sovereigns who could be imperious and dictatorial,
the brand-­new United States of America was the most democratic and egalitarian country on earth—­with one huge caveat,
of course, which was the institution of slavery. Still, the United
States became the leader in a worldwide democratic revolution that slowly overturned old governmental structures. In the
1800s, another philosopher inspired the United States even further, the British thinker John Stuart Mill. In his book On Liberty,
Mill argued that as long as p­ eople have freedom of speech and
trade, as well as freedom from other state interference, they can
fail or succeed on their own merits. In the 1830s the Frenchman
Alexis de Tocqueville glowingly described the U.S. contribution to modernizing government in his classic book Democracy
in America. While many of the ideas of democracy came from
Europe—­home of ancient Greece as well as the Enlightenment
and the French Revolution—­the United States was the first
modern nation to really put those ideas into practice. Today citizens throughout the world owe the United States an enormous
debt for this enduring legacy of democratic self-­rule and limited
government.
Now that we are well into the twenty-­first century, one
might ask whether some new ideas about government are worth
considering. Recently two members of the staff of the British
magazine The Economist—­a publication that has long advocated free-­market policies and been a fan of the United States—­
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tackled the challenge of rethinking government today in a book
called The Fourth Revolution: The Global Race to Reinvent the
State. In it John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge ponder,
among other things, the work of that nineteenth-­century British
philosopher who has so inspired the United States, John Stuart
Mill. Today Mill’s ideas about freedom from state interference
remain an inspiration for many Americans who want to dismantle as many government ser­vices as possible.
The irony, however, is that Mill himself realized later in life
that his early ideas were faulty. Mill’s reasons for changing his
mind, based on his observations of the inequalities and social
problems around him in Britain, are summarized by Mickle­
thwait and Wooldridge as follows: “How could you judge each
individual on his merits when dunces went to Eton and geniuses
were sent up chimneys? How could individuals achieve their
full potential unless society played a role in providing them with
a good start in life?” And: “Wasn’t a state that denied a poor
man a decent education also restraining his potential happiness
and freedom?” For Micklethwait and Wooldridge, the way
Mill’s own ideas evolved is representative of the debate between
­people who see certain government functions as an obstacle to liberty, and those who see certain government functions as essential
to creating the basic foundation for liberty. Mill himself actually
turned toward the latter view, as would the Nordic nations later.
Another favorite thinker in the United States when it comes
to the role of government is the Scottish philosopher Adam
Smith. Famously, Smith argued that if everyone acts in his or
her own self-­interest, resources will be divided optimally for
everyone’s benefit, as if guided by an “invisible hand.” Today
Smith’s theory also remains beloved by those in the United
States who argue that government ser­vices should be shuttered
in favor of the superior workings of the free market.
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The problem with Smith, though, is similar to the one
with Mill. Smith devised his theory in the 1700s, but as time
has progressed, many observers and societies have discovered
that the “invisible hand” suffers from a substantial technical
difficulty—­it doesn’t actually work the way Smith predicted.
For example, as Micklethwait and Wooldridge remind us, the
brutal era of industrialization demonstrated that to keep a free-­
market economy progressing smoothly—­indeed, so that capitalists themselves could keep making money—­factory workers
needed protections, diseases needed a cure, and children needed
an education. More and more nations turned away from oversimplistic interpretations of Smith’s theory, and instead toward
those that proposed that the state could be more of a referee and
benefactor, helping to ensure progress. This idea has turned out
to be a much better match for the complexities and challenges of
the rapidly changing modern world.
Britain, the home of both Mill and Smith, has actually been
one of the leading nations in the turn toward a more nuanced
approach to governing in the modern age. At the beginning of
the twentieth century Beatrice Webb, the daughter of a British
businessman, became one of the founders of the now-­famous
London School of Economics, going on to write a landmark
report for the British government. In order for Britain to succeed better as a society, Webb advocated a new idea: A state
must secure a “national minimum of civilized life,” including
food and education for the young, care for the sick, income for
the disabled and elderly, and living wages for workers. This
idea would become a key element in Nordic thinking. (William
Beveridge, who gave his name to the health-­care model used in
Britain and subsequently in the Nordic countries, was part of
Webb’s group.)
The United States began to progress along similar lines as
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well. The so-­called Gilded Age of the nineteenth century had
created such gaping inequality and vast injustice that government clearly had to do something to prevent America from slipping back into the Dark Ages of aristocratic autocracy—­which,
after all, the American War of Independence had been fought
to escape. Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal regulated financial markets, set maximum work hours and minimum wages,
financed public construction projects, and set up programs like
food aid to help the unemployed. (Later Lyndon B. Johnson’s
Great Society and the War on Poverty would advance the government’s role in such key areas as education and some aspects
of health care.)
However, as the twentieth century progressed, some governments in the West ran amok: Germany ended up with the
Third Reich and Hitler; in the Soviet Union the excesses of
Communism were an utter and unmitigated disaster. Even the
United States, and to some extent Britain as well, went astray.
The American government just kept getting bigger and bigger,
and while some of its projects were successful—­Social Security,
to name one—­many were too sprawling, too unwieldy, and
involved micromanaging too many different projects in too
many areas of life for too many targeted groups—­all without
the beneficial effects of increasing equality of opportunity. “Put
simply,” Micklethwait and Wooldridge say, “big government
overextended itself.” It’s no wonder that when Ronald Reagan
and Margaret Thatcher came along in the 1980s, promising to
get rid of as much government as possible, they captured the
imagination of many of their citizens. Ever since then “big government” has been a derogatory term in the American lexicon,
and with good reason.
The trouble is, many Americans have come to believe there
is no middle ground—­no role for government ser­vices that
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might be “smart” rather than “big.” Government, in whatever
form, has come to be seen as the enemy. In one recent poll a
third of Americans even believed that an armed rebellion might
be necessary to protect their liberties from government intrusion in the near future.
So maybe it’s no surprise that Americans don’t take kindly
to the government asking them for money.
PAY I N G T H E D U E S
When the U.S. presidential primary campaign began in 2011,
I found myself cheering on one of the Republican contenders:
the famously antigovernment former governor of Texas, Rick
Perry, as he waved his proposal in the air to create a fantastically
simple, postcard-­size income tax form. I also wanted to tell him:
That’s Finland for you! As unbelievable as it may sound to an
American, every year that I have to fill out my absurdly complex U.S. tax forms, I feel profoundly nostalgic about paying my
Finnish taxes.
My tax form had been one page long, and came prefilled
with my earnings and taxes paid, including the calculations for
amounts owed or refunded. My job was simply to check that everything was correct and amend it if needed. During my years
as a salaried employee, I mostly just looked it over and did nothing. As a freelancer I had to add my expenses and send the form
back, but even then the process was incredibly simple. All individuals were taxed separately, regardless of their marital status,
and shared deductions were split between spouses.
More surprisingly, having heard my entire life how much
higher European taxes are than American taxes, I was stunned
how high my total American tax rate turned out to be after
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paying federal, state, city, Social Security, and Medicare taxes.
Not all Americans pay city taxes, of course, and some don’t pay
state taxes, but a great many do pay substantial property taxes,
which in Finland are a small fraction of what they are in the
United States. At the end of my second year of trying to build a
business for myself as a freelance journalist in New York City,
in 2011, my income after expenses had come to a not terribly
impressive $33,900. Once I had all my financial figures for the
year, I sat down and did the math. It turned out that I would
owe more in taxes in New York than in Finland, while getting
significantly less in return. In Finland, even as a freelancer, as
I’ve noted, my taxes bought me hugely valuable benefits such
as paid sick days and, if I had a child, maternity leave payments
and affordable day care. Not to mention that for self-­employed
entrepreneurs, a Nordic country offers a far better deal for another reason—­after I’d paid all my taxes in the United States, I
still had to spend many thousands more buying my own health
insurance. In Finland basic health care would already have been
included in the taxes I’d paid.
Of course, someone with a different income stream (and
better accountants!) might be in a different situation. The 2012
presidential campaign brought the quirks of the American tax
code into focus when it was revealed that Mitt Romney and his
wife, Ann, made $21.7 million in 2010 but paid a federal tax rate
of only 14 percent, a rate more typical of households earning
$80,000 a year. The Obamas, by contrast, paid about 26 percent
on income of $1.7 million. These calculations don’t include state
or local taxes, but the Romneys’ rate was low because much of
their income came from investments, which are taxed at a lower
rate than wages.
As with health-­care systems, it’s staggeringly complex to
try to compare tax systems between countries, and between dif-
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ferent ­people in different life situations within countries. Some
countries tax wages heavily but levy almost no payroll taxes
like the Social Security and Medicare taxes levied in the United
States. Others do exactly the opposite. Some have one income
tax rate for everyone—­a “flat tax”—­while others have progressive rates. Some focus on taxing wages, while others tax consumption or ownership. Some have only one national tax, while
others add local taxes on top of that. Almost all countries tax
families with children at lower rates than they do single p­ eople.
Because of this variety, tax comparisons between countries and
­people are often incompatible, confusing, and even intentionally
misleading.
For example, Americans often assume that ordinary Nordic
citizens pay something like 70 percent of all their income in
taxes. That is not true. Yes, Sweden’s top marginal tax rate was
at that level back in the 1980s, but those rates have fallen significantly since then, and they never applied to anyone’s total
income, only to income above a certain high threshold. However, simply comparing tax rates tells you virtually nothing
without also comparing what a person gets in return for those
taxes. A family in Country X might pay 40 percent in taxes,
while a family in Country Y might pay only 25 percent. But if
the family in Country Y has to spend another 25 percent of its
income to pay for health insurance and school tuition, and the
family in Country X does not, then the family in Country X obviously comes out way ahead, assuming that the quality of the
ser­vices is the same.
So what income tax rates are ­people actually paying in different Nordic countries? The OECD has compared average
tax rates for a single individual without children in thirty-­four
developed countries, including federal and local income taxes,
along with an employee’s social security contributions. In 2014
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Denmark had the third-­highest average tax rate at 38.4 percent,
but this was still lower than in Belgium and Germany. Finland
came in ninth, at 30.7 percent, and—­here’s a shocker—­Sweden
fell under the OECD average with a rate of 24.4 percent—­less
than the United States, which came in at 24.8 percent. It may
seem hard to believe, considering how much more Nordic citizens get in exchange for their taxes, but average Finns pay
income taxes and employee contributions at a rate only about 6
percentage points higher than the rate paid by average Americans, while average Swedes pay less than average Americans.
Overall the Nordic countries do collect more tax revenue
in relation to GDP than does the United States. In Finland,
Norway, and Sweden employers are required to contribute more
to their employees’ social security on top of their wages and employees’ own contributions than in the United States. And it will
come as no surprise that the Nordic countries tax the wealthy
more than does the United States. The Nordic countries also
tend to levy higher taxes on consumables such as food, gas, and
electronics; this is partly related to a Nordic philosophy of using
the tax code to achieve smart social goals by taxing practices or
products that harm the environment or p­ eople’s health, such as
gas-guzzling cars and alcohol.
Once again, all this talk of tax rates is mostly meaningless
unless we spell out what p­ eople get in return for their money.
The very high-­quality and reliable ser­vices that Nordic citizens
get in return for their taxes—­including: universal public health
care, affordable day care, universal free education, generous
sick pay, year-­long paid parental leaves, pensions, and the like—­
can easily incur additional tens of thousands, if not hundreds
of thousands, of dollars in after-­tax expenses for Americans.
Bottom line: For middle-­class ­people, the amount of disposable
income you end up with in the United States versus in a Nordic
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country can be very similar in the end, or even turn out to be a
better deal in a Nordic country.
“I think I had a little bit more disposable income left after
income and payroll taxes in the U.S., but our American property
tax was a killer,” said Ville, the Finnish father of two who used
to live in Westchester, New York, but has since moved back to
Finland. “And in the U.S. I should have saved for retirement,
which I don’t do in Finland because of the public retirement
funds. After all that, I think I have more disposable income in
Finland than in the U.S. If you add gas and food bills, it comes
to about the same, since those are more expensive here. But then
in the U.S. we paid a lot more for day care.”
Keep in mind, though, how these calculations would change
when Ville’s two kids reach college age. When considering
today’s American college tuitions, the Nordic deal starts to look
especially good. Overall the deal looks so good that many Nordic
citizens living in the United States return to their home countries once they have children. Life is simply easier and cheaper
for them back home.
The gap between Nordic and American attitudes toward taxes
doesn’t stem only from differences in how those taxes are used.
It is also a question of fairness. The American tax code perversely favors the wealthy, a trend that makes absolutely no
sense whatsoever for any nation trying to remain competitive
in the twenty-­first century, and a trend that has actually gotten
worse and worse over the past few decades. The issue here isn’t
whether p­ eople should be allowed to get rich; of course they
should. The issue, rather, is that in America p­ eople who have
much more security than others are contributing proportionately much less of their income to the maintenance of the basic
needs shared by everyone in society. In the Nordic countries it’s
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a no‑brainer that the rich are expected to contribute proportionately more. Top marginal income tax rates in the Nordic countries, including national and local taxes and employees’ social
security contributions, hover around 50 percent. Again, these
rates apply only to income above a certain threshold, which in
2014 varied from the equivalent of about $63,000 in Denmark
to about $115,000 in Finland—­per individual. In the United
States the top rate was somewhat lower than in most Nordic
countries—­although it was actually higher than in Norway and
Iceland—­and it applied only to income over some $400,000.
To an American ear these figures may start to sound scary,
but let’s pause to note whom exactly such tax policies would
actually affect. It’s pretty safe to say that around 95 percent of
all Americans would not be affected if the United States had
Finland’s top marginal tax rate rules. Based on 2011 data, 96
percent of American individuals had income of less than
$109,000, according to calculations by the Tax Policy Center.
A majority of Americans actually seem to agree with these
Nordic attitudes. Many surveys have been conducted in which
Americans say that taxes on the wealthy should be raised. And
yet that hasn’t happened; in fact the reverse has. “The effective
tax rate for the wealthiest in this country—­the rate actually paid
after factoring in exclusions, deductions, credits, and other preferential treatment—­has fallen dramatically,” stated the Senate
Budget Committee chairman Kent Conrad in 2012. “In fact,
the effective tax rate for the 400 wealthiest taxpayers fell from
almost 30 percent in 1985 to 18.1 percent in 2008.”
It has gotten to the point today where even many wealthy
Americans themselves agree with Conrad and are trying to
figure out how to pay more. Such luminaries as the billionaire
investor Warren Buffett and the novelist Stephen King have
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been writing op-­eds telling the government to start taxing them
at higher rates. If everyone in the country was getting the same
low rates, that would be one thing. But that’s not the case. President Obama has noted that both his and Warren Buffett’s tax
rates are lower than those of their secretaries.
The Nordic nations are living proof that even with higher
taxes on the wealthy and on certain consumables, a country can
remain competitive, rich, and happy. The dynamism and wealth
of Nordic societies in fact give the lie to the argument so often
heard in American political debates that higher taxes, especially
on the rich, would discourage entrepreneurial activity, innovation, and the growth of businesses. What most motivates ­people
is actually their relative wealth compared with others, not their
absolute wealth, and other factors such as their status, sense of
accomplishment, and relative quality of life. As there would be
in any country, Finland has citizens who hate the tax system and
try to avoid it, but on the whole, ­people in the Nordic countries
see their system as being more or less fair. They get real value
in return for their money—­even the well-­off do—­and they can
still pursue an income higher than their neighbor if they want
to. There is no good reason why tax reform in the United States
could not lead to similar results. All one needs to do is pair it
with smart government.
GOOD-B
­ Y E TO “ B I G G OV E R N M E N T ”
If you had to boil down the difference between the United States
and the Nordic countries to a simple phrase, one way to say it
might be: The United States has an unfair tax system and big
government, while the Nordic countries have a fair tax system
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and smart government. Another way to describe the difference
is that the United States is stuck in the past and the Nordic
countries are already living in the future. This is how John
Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge of The Economist frame
the conversation. They begin the final section of their book with
a chapter titled “The Place Where the Future Happened First.”
They make no bones about it. It’s clear to them that the place
where the future has happened first is the Nordic countries, and
it’s in every nation’s interest today to try to borrow the best from
their example.
One of the reasons the Nordic countries have arrived in
the future first is that after their 1990s financial crisis they set
about reinventing their governments to nurture capitalism for
the twenty-­first century, making them less bloated, much more
efficient, and more fiscally responsible. They did cut public
spending and taxes, but they also invested in their p­ eople. In
addition they added more choices to taxpayer-­funded ser­vices,
and created new systems to foster business. Denmark, for example, is famous today for its “flexicurity” system, designed to
help businesses adjust to the fast-­changing global economy—­
but without ruining lives. The system allows employers to fire
workers easily, but it also guarantees the ­people who’ve been
fired a decent benefits package for up to two years, as well as
help finding a new job.
The Nordic country that Micklethwait and Wooldridge
admire most is Sweden. For starters, the Swedish government
maintains a strict budget surplus—­at least 1 percent—­over an
economic cycle, and sets limits on what the government can
spend in a given year. The model is flexible and allows for increased spending during a downturn, but the rules are stringent:
The lost ground must be made up during the next upswing.
The assumption that Nordic government spending is
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bloated, and must therefore be inefficient, comes from oft-­cited
statistics showing government expenditures in relation to GDP
to be significantly bigger than in America. And indeed Nordic
governments do spend much more in relation to GDP than
does the United States. That’s hardly surprising, considering
that they use tax revenue and government spending to provide
ser­vices such as health care, pensions, and day care, which obviously increases government spending, while the United States
leaves citizens to make these arrangements with private providers. In addition this metric is generally a poor tool for comparing efficiency. It tells us how much money a government sends
out to the world, but it doesn’t say anything about the nature of
that spending, since different governments pay for very different ser­vices.
A better way of comparing efficiency is looking at how
much each country spends on a specific, comparable basket of
ser­vices, regardless of who pays for it. The OECD has done
exactly this, and found that when it comes to a specific array
of social ser­vices, including items such as health care, pensions,
unemployment benefits, child care, or credits for families with
children, the United States ends up spending almost exactly as
much as Sweden does in relation to GDP. Not only that, but
Finland, Denmark, and Norway all spent less than the United
States in relation to GDP for the same basket of ser­vices. This
makes Nordic countries more efficient than the United States in
producing these essential ser­vices—­they pay less, but the quality
and results of their ser­vices are in many ways just as good or
even better than what Americans get.
Overall the secret to Nordic success is not complicated.
Nordic societies have simply taken the job of government seriously. They make mistakes and have their troubles, but they
keep tweaking their systems in search of improvements, and
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they work hard to balance the books. They prove that there is
nothing inherent in government that automatically makes it less
efficient for arranging social ser­vices than the private sector.
When it comes to technology, science, entertainment, and creating businesses, Americans are the smartest folks in the room.
When it comes to government, it has to be said that they are, for
the time being at least, the last in the class. Yet there is no reason
why Americans couldn’t get their house in order. Anyone who’s
ever read Alexis de Tocqueville’s tribute Democracy in America
knows how much the early American government got right.
What the United States needs is not bigger government but
smarter government, government for the twenty-­first century
that is simpler and more transparent, that provides the basic
social ser­vices and regulations that a government can best provide, and that then leaves the market free of all the targeted
meddling that the United States is infamous for now. Despite
the general atmosphere of frustration that has encircled government in the United States, this is an entirely realizable goal. In
fact proposals and actions for smarter government are already
percolating all over America.
New legislation and policies by state and local governments
have already succeeded in many places in the United States in
circumventing political gridlock in the federal government.
Many states and cities have done wonders for their education
systems, and several have already created their own parental
leave, minimum wage, or even health-­care systems. Proposals
to restrict the role of money in politics through state or local
action could change things further.
Handing over the drawing of congressional districts to independent commissions would stop politicians from manipulating the districts for their own gain and force them to appeal
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to a broader base. Limiting the veto powers of different actors
in Congress would help spur the crafting of effective legislation. Technology can be used to make current government ser­
vices more efficient. Even the federal government is running
many ser­vices reasonably successfully already—­Social Security,
Medicare—­and it is pushing through new policies, despite the
challenges.
The idea that the American economy would be destroyed
if the wealthy were asked to pay their fair share of tax revenue
has been refuted many times; when the Clinton administration
raised taxes in the 1990s, an economic boom followed. The government could start taxing investment income at similar rates as
wage income, as it used to do under Ronald Reagan, or it could
pass the so-­called Buffett Rule—­inspired by the billionaire
Warren Buffett himself—­that would ensure that all million-­
dollar earners and above pay at least 30 percent of their income
in taxes. Or, the government could simply eliminate the copious tax breaks and loopholes that have crept into the tax code,
which have made it so complicated, so unfairly beneficial to the
well-­off, and so burdensome to everyone else.
These are just a few examples and ideas. But in the country
that experimented with perfecting freedom and democracy in
the first place, shouldn’t it be possible to rethink government
in the twenty-­first century? So go ahead: Ask what your country can do for you.
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SEVEN
THE LANDS OF
OPPORTUNITY
B R I N G I N G B AC K
THE AMERICAN DREAM
A TA L E O F T WO C I T I E S
The man was wearing several layers of clothing, including two
pairs of pants, and his face was covered by a beard, strands of
matted hair, and dirt. He was mumbling to himself, surrounded
by tattered bags containing all his belongings. Then he peed in
his pants. We got up and moved farther away, just as others had
done before us. The stench, though, was inescapable, and I had
to cover my nose and mouth to suppress a gag.
This could have been a scene from a Charles Dickens novel
depicting the impoverished suffering of the nineteenth century.
It could have been a scene in some dirt-­poor Third World country. But it took place in an otherwise clean and orderly twenty-­
first-century New York City subway car, not long after my
arrival in the United States, and it left me disturbed for days.
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I had seen homeless p­ eople before, of course. But never in my
life had I seen such an utter, complete, total wreck of a human
being as that man on the New York City subway, and certainly
never back home in Helsinki.
The Nordic countries have their psychiatric patients, alcoholics, drug addicts, and unemployed, but I couldn’t imagine a
person in a similar state roaming the streets of Finland’s capital or any other Nordic city. Usually everyone has someplace to
stay, if not in public housing, then in a decent shelter. And while
you see the occasional person talking to themselves in public, the
health-­care systems reach more of the mentally ill than in the
United States. Encountering the man on the New York subway
was one of the moments that made it clear to me early on that in
the United States you are really on your own.
Eventually I got so used to seeing the homeless that I stopped
paying attention. Instead my attention was drawn to the other
end of the spectrum.
As I began meeting ­people and sometimes getting invited to
events or gatherings in apartments with roof decks, or gorgeous
lofts with windows overlooking the Manhattan skyline, or
brownstones with several floors and backyard gardens, I began
performing a new calculation in my head. How were they able
to afford it all? Some of these p­ eople were lawyers, doctors, or
financiers, which easily explained their wealth, but some were
artists, employees of nonprofits, or freelancers working on their
own projects. Their well-­appointed lifestyles mystified me, but
I felt awe and cheer when faced with such uplifting examples
of America’s ability to remunerate talent. The American dream
seemed to be alive and well, not to mention within my reach. If
all these p­ eople were making it, surely I could, too.
Finally I realized that many of the ­people with an expen-
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sive lifestyle but a seemingly low-­earning profession had family
money supporting them. I hope it doesn’t take someone from
stuffy old Europe, like me, to point out that inheriting wealth,
rather than making it yourself, is the opposite of the American
dream. America became an independent nation partly to leave
behind the entrenched aristocracy of the old country, to secure
the opportunity for Americans to be self-­made men and women.
I’d traveled the globe, and I’d lived in Finland, France, and
Australia. Now in America I felt as if I’d arrived not in the land
of Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Martin Luther
King, but in that proverbial nineteenth-­century banana republic
of extremes—­entrenched wealth, power, and privilege on the
one hand and desperate poverty, homelessness, and misfortune
on the other. A cliché, yes. But that makes the reality of it no less
brutal. Never before had I seen such blatant inequality, not in
any other nation in the modern industrialized world.
For someone coming from a Nordic country, it’s hard to comprehend the kinds of income inequalities one encounters in the
United States. The twenty-­five top American hedge fund managers made almost one billion dollars—­each—­in 2013, while
the median income for an American household hovered around
fifty thousand dollars. At the same time homeless shelters were
overflowing with record numbers of ­people seeking help. It’s
telling that many of them were not drug addicts or the mentally
ill, but working families. The United States has returned to the
age of the Rockefellers, Carnegies, and The Great Gatsby, and
the trend in that direction isn’t showing signs of slowing. After
the financial crisis, incomes for the wealthiest bounced back
quickly, while the vast majority of Americans saw little improvement. Between 2009 and 2012, the top 1 percent captured
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more than 90 percent of the entire country’s gains in income.
This is not a problem that is only connected to the financial
crisis. The share of income going to the richest Americans—­
the 1 percent, or even the 0.1 percent—­has grown dramatically
in recent decades, while the rest of America has faced stagnating
incomes or even seen wages diminish.
The reasons commonly given in America for these changes
are by now familiar. There’s globalization, free trade, deregulation, and new technology, which allow the brightest talent to
reign over larger realms and to amass more wealth. Today the
most visionary CEO presides over a vast multinational corporation, instead of having fifty top executives running smaller
companies. The best product is now sold everywhere, replacing local products. Because of advances in technology and the
outsourcing of low-­skilled work to poorer countries, workers
in developed countries need increasingly specialized skills. The
few who have such skills benefit. The many who don’t suffer.
At the same time arrangements at work have become less stable.
Part-­time and low-­paying work has become more common, as
technology has let employers optimize production, and as the
power of labor unions has faded.
However, these oft-­
repeated reasons are not the whole
story. Every wealthy nation is dealing with all these dislocating
changes, not just the United States. Yet how different the experience has been in places like the Nordic countries, which have
made serious efforts to adapt to this brave new future with smart
government policies that fit the times. Rising inequality doesn’t
simply result from inevitable changes in the free market. Much
of it follows from specific policies, which can direct change in
one way or in another. Even though the times demand the
opposite, American taxes have become more favorable to the
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wealthy. Partly as a result of this shortsighted change, American
social policies have had to move from supporting the poorest to
having to help prop up the middle class. Income inequality has
increased everywhere, but in the United States it’s particularly
pronounced because taxes and government ser­vices do less to
mitigate the effects of the changes in the marketplace than elsewhere in the modern developed world.
Observers from the Nordic countries like me aren’t the
only ones confused by America’s anachronistic new reality—­
Americans are, too. When one study asked Americans to estimate the current distribution of wealth in the United States, the
respondents dramatically underestimated the level of inequality. When asked to “build a better America” by constructing distributions with their ideal level of inequality, they came up with
distributions that were far more equitable than even their erroneously low estimates of the actual distribution. Finally respondents were shown pie charts depicting distributions of wealth in
unnamed nations and told to choose which nation they would
rather join out of pairs of two, given what’s called a “Rawls
constraint” for determining a just society: “In considering this
question, imagine that if you joined this nation, you would be
randomly assigned to a place in the distribution, so you could
end up anywhere in this distribution, from the very richest to
the very poorest.” Without knowing which countries the charts
were based on, more than 90 percent of Americans passed over
the chart portraying the distribution of wealth in the United
States and chose instead the chart that portrayed Sweden.
It would seem that the average American is already far
more sympathetic to the basic tenets of the Nordic theory of
love than might be imagined. And yet, there are voices in the
United States as well as in Europe that continue to insist that
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the vast inequalities of the twenty-­first century are the new
status quo, the unavoidable result of technological progress. In
reality practically all studies show that in our hypermodern age,
in which globalization, free trade, deregulation, and new technology have upended traditional relationships, the societies that
are succeeding, and will continue to succeed, are those like the
Nordic countries that enact smart government policies to ensure
the health of their human capital. As more and more citizens
need high levels of education, and then go on to work as freelancers, entrepreneurs, or on short-­term contracts and projects
in today’s dynamic economies, Nordic-­style government is the
key to a nation’s success.
Still, many Americans hold on to the idea that income
inequality is an inevitable and perhaps even desirable state of
affairs. This is understandable, considering that America has
long been known as a place where everyone has a chance to improve his or her lot in life. That’s what the American dream is
all about: pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, rising from
rags to riches. Naturally those who work hard earn more
reward. It shouldn’t matter if some are significantly wealthier
than others as long as everyone has a fair chance at success. The
trouble is, when it comes to opportunity, the United States has
been moving further and further in the other direction. That
chance at success is becoming smaller and smaller.
F R O M FAT H E R TO S O N
America has long defined itself as the land of opportunity. But
what does this mean? The best way to quantify opportunity is to
measure upward social mobility—­the ability of ­people to raise
their standards of living and have their children do better than
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they did. America does possess a proud and indelible legacy:
It has offered a new life to millions of immigrants—­myself
included—­throughout much of its history. But survey after
survey reveals that upward social mobility has declined in the
United States, while it has increased in other places, especially in
northern Europe and particularly in the Nordic region.
There is no shortage of clear and convincing evidence for
this. For example, take the correlation of a father’s income with
that of his son. A Canadian professor named Miles Corak found
that in the United States and Britain, the least mobile societies,
nearly half of the advantage that a father may have had in his
time is passed on to a son in adulthood, and this was not the
result of the son’s own hard work and personal successes but can
be explained by the advantages of belonging to the right family.
In the Nordic countries, by contrast, there is far less of this sort
of unfair advantage. Some of the most cited studies on this question have been led by Markus Jäntti, a Finnish economist at the
University of Helsinki, who with his colleagues looked at inherited disadvantage—­in other words, how much worse your
chances are for success if you’re born into a low-­income family.
They found that in the United States, 40 percent of men who
were born into the lowest income bracket stayed in it. In the
Nordic countries, that figure was only 25 percent.
There is a very clear and straightforward reason for the difference. As several studies have demonstrated, societies with
less income inequality tend to have greater upward mobility for
their citizens. The United States is stuck so far in the past when
it comes to equal opportunity that President Obama’s economic
adviser Alan Krueger came up with the term “the Great Gatsby
Curve” to describe the connection between the rising inequality
and falling social mobility in America. It is certainly possible
to start poor and end up rich in the United States, but research
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shows that doing so is much harder there than in other wealthy
nations. America is no longer the land of opportunity—­northern
Europe is. This is the reality that led the British Labour Party
leader Ed Miliband to make his surprising statement in 2012:
“If you want the American dream, go to Finland.”
The reasons for the crumbling of the American dream have
been debated, but the most obvious culprits are American inequalities in income, health care, education, and resources available to families. It’s no mystery why this is the case: The United
States has simply not committed to basic public policies that
ensure equality of opportunity the way the Nordic countries
have.
In Finland the simple commitment that the nation made
to unify Finnish education into one high-­quality K–12 school
system for all has made an enormous difference. Two countries
may spend the same percentage of their gross domestic product
on education, but as Miles Corak has noted, if this spending is
directed to high-­quality early-­childhood education, and to primary and secondary schooling accessible for all, it is likely to
create much more equality of opportunity than if it were directed to high-­quality private university-­level education that
is accessible to only a few. Obviously Finland has deliberately
adopted the former approach in order to meet the challenges of
the twenty-­first century, while America has been stuck with the
latter approach, to the severe and direct detriment of millions of
its children.
Affordable health care, day care, schools, and universities
support equity of opportunities, but in the United States the
availability of such ser­vices is not only severely limited, it has
also been deteriorating in recent decades. Getting a good education is becoming increasingly difficult and expensive. American
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low-­income families find more and more obstacles in their way,
while the wealthy can buy their children all the props they need:
books, hobbies, tutors, private schools, doctors, and connections.
Time after time I admired some American superachiever only
to discover that his or her parents, too, were outstanding in their
own fields, and had money.
There’s nothing wrong with a society in which parents who
achieve success instill a similar drive for success in their children. But that’s different from a society in which a relatively
small number of families have vastly more financial and logistical resources than everyone else, and can provide many more
tangible advantages to their children every step of the way. In
the United States I was much less likely to discover that the successful person I’d met had succeeded despite his or her family
background rather than because of it. A fantastic diversity of
talents is born into children across all classes of American society. Yet among far too many of these children—­the ones who
aren’t wealthy in particular—­these talents aren’t being discovered and nurtured. In other words they are being wasted.
The Nordic countries feel that they can’t afford to waste the
potential of any of their children, no matter what their fortunes
in life.
Kaarina—­the mother who’d told me about how liberating it
was to have her husband take paternity leave and bond with
their children—­experienced a terrible family loss when her
children were a few years older. Tragically Kaarina’s husband
died of cancer. He hadn’t taken out life insurance, and unfortunately she didn’t have much in the way of other family support.
Kaarina was left to pay the family’s mortgage and support her
two young children all by herself.
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This was a terrible emotional blow, and for an American
middle-­class family it might well have been a terrible financial
blow as well. Yet in Finland, Kaarina managed to get through
her husband’s illness and death without incurring any debt. For
starters, of course there weren’t any significant medical bills for
his cancer treatment. Then she and her children received a survivor’s pension from the government, in addition to all the usual
benefits available to families. Her children could, naturally, also
continue studying for free in their high-­quality public school,
and could attend the subsidized after-­school clubs. When her
older son decided that he wanted to attend an English-­language
high school, located in a neighborhood dominated by diplomats
and wealthy families, all he needed to do was pass the entrance
exam. No tuition was needed, and public transportation took
him there. The children continued to engage in hobbies they
chose freely: swimming in the public pool, judo four times a
week at a local club, gym at their school’s facilities, and mixed
martial arts at the free, publicly funded municipal sports center.
None of their activities were expensive, because the operations
were largely funded by the municipality and available to all.
Later, should they want to go to college, that will be tuition-­free
as well. And since healthy parental leave policies for both Kaarina and her husband had allowed her to keep working at the
same time that they’d raised their kids, she had a solid freelance
career to fall back on after he died.
Kaarina’s husband’s death was still devastating, and needless to say she had all my sympathies. She also had my curiosity. At one point I asked her what she thought it had meant
for her to have Finland’s social policies in place when fate had
dealt her such a difficult hand. “I’m a good example of what
happens to a person who has no family and no employer to sup-
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port them,” Kaarina told me. “Anywhere else in the world, anywhere outside of the Nordic countries, my family’s life and my
kids’ future, not to mention my own economic and social status,
would have changed dramatically and permanently. Now the
loss is only personal, if you will. Any other time in history, my
sons would have been struck by an immense tragedy also in
light of their futures.”
This is what it means to have deliberate social policies to
support the autonomy of individuals, to secure the independence of children, and to ensure the development of children’s
talents for the future. In America, if you’re lucky enough, you
might have the private resources to keep you on track through
life’s challenges. You might also end up haunted by the knowledge that you may have gotten unfair advantages over others
who are suffering. This can have the debilitating effect of undercutting ­people’s sense that they are the master of their fate,
that they’ve earned their own success.
Personally I was able to live my life in Finland not only
taking pride in my own achievements but also taking pride in
my participation in a social contract that went to extraordinary
lengths to give every individual a fair shot at success. No one can
shield children from the pain of a parent’s death, or the trauma
of dealing with mental illness, addiction, violence, or other troubles in a family. Children will always grow up in a variety of
circumstances, some better than others. Still, I was able to take
satisfaction in my own achievements exactly because I knew
that my society did its best to offer everyone the same opportunities—­at least as much as any country in the world at the
moment—­and that in comparison with other ­people, my personal achievements were my own, and not simply the result of
being blessed with a fortunate family background.
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In addition, I could reach for my own dream without having
to focus solely on the one thing that most Americans today have
to worry about constantly: money.
THE FUTURE OF THE MIDDLE CLASS
Here’s a statement: The United States is one of the world’s richest countries, and its middle class is the world’s best-­off middle
class. The first part of that statement is still true. The second
part was once true but is no longer. A study of income data in
different countries over thirty-­five years revealed that after-­
tax incomes of middle-­class families in Canada—­which were
substantially behind those in the United States in 2000—­now
appear to be higher than those of their neighbors to the south.
Median incomes in many European countries still trail those in
the United States, but the gap in several, including Norway and
Sweden, is much smaller than it was a decade ago. These trends
shouldn’t be surprising. Even though the American economy
has grown significantly over the past few decades, the typical
American family in 2013 earned no more than it did in 1988.
The poor in the United States fare far worse. A family at the
lowest fifth of the income distribution makes significantly less
money than does a similar family in Canada, Sweden, Norway,
Finland, or the Netherlands. Thirty-­five years ago the reverse
was true.
But these figures only tell part of the story. From their
shrinking share of take-­
home pay, middle-­
class Americans
are also trying to cover rising costs for health care, child care,
and education. In the Nordic countries, whether p­ eople make
somewhat more or less than middle-­or lower-­class Americans,
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Nordic citizens don’t have to rob their own take-­home pay to
fund these other parts of life. The United States still offers some
the chance to become fantastically rich, but for the vast majority of Americans, even just a comfortable middle-­class life has
become harder and harder to reach and maintain.
The means to restore the vitality of the American dream are
well known and available. The OECD recommends three steps
to counter the changes that have unsettled the labor market: investing in the workforce by offering easy access to education,
health care, and day care; creating better jobs that pay more,
especially on the lower rungs of the income ladder; and using
a well-­designed tax system to temper inequality and increase
opportunity.
Americans are ready for these changes. In a 2014 survey by
the Pew Research Center, U.S. respondents considered the growing gap between the rich and the poor the greatest threat to the
world today, ahead of religious and ethnic hatred or pollution
and environmental problems. States and cities have been raising
the minimum wage on their own. Fast-­food chains have started
paying their workers higher wages—­some even fifteen dollars
an hour—­while still making profits. And as the Nobel Prize–
winning economist Paul Krugman has pointed out, the United
States actually has a long tradition of letting the biggest earners
and possessors of the largest fortunes contribute more in taxes.
The Nordic countries offer a clear road map for dealing
with growing inequality in the United States. Another Nobel
Prize–winning economist, Joseph Stiglitz, has noted that
Sweden, Finland, and Norway have all succeeded in achieving
about as fast or faster per-­capita income growth as the United
States, but with far greater equality. While class distinctions in
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the U.S. become more deeply entrenched and social mobility
becomes more and more a myth, in Nordic countries upward
mobility is a healthy reality.
Building this framework costs everyone a bit of money. And
yes, those who do very well by it are asked to pay quite a bit
more. That’s because the lives of the very rich are already fantastically good, and there’s an acknowledgement that additional
wealth beyond a certain point has diminishing returns for personal satisfaction—­something that should be obvious, but that
is also increasingly supported by research. Walk around the
streets of Helsinki or Stockholm for a few days, and you’ll see
rich ­people driving brand-­new BMWs, Porsches, even the occasional Ferrari. What you won’t see so much of is rich ­people
who own four or five Ferraris. Frankly, Nordics would rather
have health care and good schools.
On the whole, Nordic citizens support the arrangement because it is so obviously fair and generally works so well. What
Finland and its neighbors do is actually walk the walk of opportunity that America now only talks. It’s a fact: A citizen of
Finland, Norway, or Denmark is today much more likely to rise
above his or her parents’ socioeconomic status than is a citizen
of the United States. All this means that in the Nordic countries
­people actually end up being able to create wealth for themselves.
Government in the Nordic countries tends to be like a referee
who makes sure that the field is level and the rules are followed,
but who then steps out of the way and lets the competitors determine who gets the highest score. If the referee were to stop the
game and take points away from the winners and give them to
the losers, which is what some Americans seem to think happens
in the Nordic countries, of course no one would want to play. It’s
exactly because that’s not the way it works that Nordic citizens
find their system to be in their own best interests.
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Although the Nordic theory of love may predispose the
Nordic nations to the recipe for success that they’ve developed
and put to such effective use, there is nothing inherently Nordic
about it. Today many Americans actually see the issues of taxation, income inequality, and opportunity in ways that reflect the
same core values as the Nordic theory of love, and are working toward policies more appropriate for the challenges of the
twenty-­first century.
The United States is still the country that ­people elsewhere
in the world look up to. It has created a way of life that many
­people in the world can only dream of, a life steeped in individual freedom, material wealth, and a liberating degree of choice
in everything from shopping to religion to lifestyle. It continues to welcome immigrants, and millions are drawn in by its
promise of opportunity and a better life. It should not let those
wonderful, essential features about itself be lost. Rather, it can
and should do more to protect them. For the United States has
strayed from its own ideals, and in reality, Americans today
enjoy less opportunity than do p­ eople of other wealthy nations.
The land of opportunity needs to bring the opportunity back.
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EIGHT
BUSINESS AS
UNUSUAL
H OW TO R U N A C O M PA N Y I N
T H E T W E N T Y- F
­ IRST CENTURY
CLASHES OF CLANS AND ANGRY BIRDS
The October weather in Helsinki was at its worst. It was raining
steadily, and the whole world seemed enveloped in a gray, wet,
cold cloak. Walking toward the nondescript office buildings at
nine in the morning, staring at the wet asphalt, I was reminded
of why so many Finns struggle to get through the long winter.
On this day, however, I opened a door to a different world
entirely—­one of bright orange walls, canary yellow and forest
green chairs, pink curtains, sneakers thrown in piles by the coat­
rack as if I’d walked into a house full of teenagers, and huge
white blocks of letters in the middle of the space spelling “SUPERCELL.” The company had recently announced that the
Japanese telecommunications giant SoftBank had bought a 51
percent stake in it for $1.5 billion—­a huge sum for an online
game start-­up employing only around a hundred p­ eople.
In some ways Supercell’s story is typical of start-­ups all over
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the world. Six experienced game makers started the company
in Helsinki in 2010. The first games Supercell created were failures, but in the summer of 2012 it published a game called Hay
Day for Apple tablets and phones, and a few months later Clash
of Clans followed. The games became phenomenal successes,
topping app charts around the world and making Supercell
more than two million dollars a day in 2013. The following year
was even better: The company tripled its revenues and doubled
its profits. Supercell’s business model was praised in the media
all over the world, including in the United States. By early 2015
the company had become such a high-­profile player that it was
able to splurge on a lavish Super Bowl ad for Clash of Clans,
starring the movie actor Liam Neeson.
What was most interesting about Supercell for me, however, was that it dispels one of the most persistent myths that
Americans believe about the Nordic way of life: that its “nanny
state” kills initiative and innovation. Since Nordic governments
hand everything to their citizens on a plate, this thinking goes,
­people become passive and uncreative—­or worse, their spirits
are crushed. After all, why would anyone bother working hard
if they’re too comfortable? And how can any company succeed,
let alone be innovative, if it’s constantly burdened by high taxes
and by employees coddled with all sorts of rights?
While the Nordic countries may have created a secure life
for the middle class, and equality of opportunity for their children, surely Nordic lands are little more than barren deserts
when it comes to American-­style entrepreneurial spirit. Indeed,
according to this logic, Supercell should be the biggest failure in
the world.
Supercell’s employees are encouraged to go home at 5:00 p.m.
All employees, not just the founders and managers, get stock
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options. They work in small teams—­
“cells”—­
that develop
a game autonomously and have control over its fate. If they
decide that the game they’re working on is not turning out to be
top-­notch, and that they should kill it even though that means
throwing away months of work, they can decide to do that. All
that is asked is that they share what they’ve learned in the process with the rest of the company. Ilkka Paananen, a serial entrepreneur in his thirties, is one of the founders and the CEO of
the company, and he believes that the keys to Supercell’s success
are a lack of bureaucracy, small and nimble units, sharing, and
committed but independent workers—­in short, collaborative
relationships built on positions of autonomy. It’s a bit like the
corporate cousin of the Nordic theory of love.
Paananen doesn’t see any problem with starting and running an innovative business in Finland. “Finland has a great
education system and excellent health care,” he told me when I
met with him, checking off Finland’s advantages. “The bureaucracy involved in starting and running a business is negligible.
Basic infrastructure works really well. In my industry public
funding is well developed, perhaps the best in the world. Finland has a strong, straightforward work culture, with ambition
and a drive for quality. The workdays are maybe shorter than
in the United States, but I’d claim that what we lose in time, we
win in efficiency. And I believe that better work-­life balance, as
Americans say, contributes to that efficiency.” Paananen smiled.
“What else? Those come to mind first.”
When Paananen talks about public funding, he’s referring
to a Finnish government fund that invests in research, development, and innovation in order to compensate for one of Finland’s shortfalls: the lack of private venture capital. Of course
today many Finnish companies receive significant funding
from abroad. One of the early investors in Supercell was Accel
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Partners, a Silicon Valley venture capital firm that counts among
its other investments Facebook, as well as another Finnish game
company, Rovio, the creator of the world-­famous mobile game
Angry Birds.
Even the supposedly high Finnish taxes fail to sour
Paananen’s view. He noted that Finland’s corporate tax rate is
in fact relatively low—­20 percent in 2015 compared with the
American rate of 39 percent—­and after a company pays its taxes
in Finland, it’s done. It doesn’t have to offer its employees health
insurance or pension benefits, which both burden American
companies with significant costs on top of their taxes. At the
time I visited, logistical matters for Supercell’s entire Finland-­
based operation of more than a hundred employees could be
overseen by an administrative staff of just two ­people. Supercell had to employ another two administrators in the United
States for its American office—­for a staff there of only twenty
employees. “That’s what it comes down to,” Paananen said. “If
the society doesn’t handle these things, the company has to take
care of them.” If the United States is so worried about crushing
entrepreneurship and innovation, a good place to start would be
freeing start-­ups and companies from the burdens of babysitting the nation’s citizens.
Paananen knows American realities well because he spent
years working for an American game company, Digital Chocolate, after it bought his previous company. One of the problems he remembers the company having in the United States
was the constant fight to keep employees. Not because he or
the company he worked for were bad employers, but because
American society forces ­people to put a premium on money. In
Silicon Valley employees are always vying for a better offer, and
when they get one they tend to jump ship. In Finland employees may have fewer options, but Paananen thinks that much of
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the difference comes from the fact that Nordic society makes it
easier for p­ eople to have a good life without constantly worrying about money. From an employers’ point of view, this means
that employees tend to be more loyal; they’re more likely to stay
at a company for the long term, as long as they like their jobs.
For the employer this makes planning easier and cuts costs for
hiring and training.
Because of this long-­term view, Paananen is not fazed by
his employees’ long paid vacations—­five weeks annually—­or
parental leaves when they have kids, either. “I think about it this
way: If you employ an incredibly talented person, it would be a
real shame to ruin that relationship because they want to take
a leave of one year at some point to see their child grow. In the
long term, what difference does one year make, if our goal is to
work together for twenty years?”
When it comes to taxes, Paananen and his Supercell colleagues
might as well be spokes­people for the Nordic theory of love.
There is perhaps no greater testament to what it means to belong
to a society that invests in its ­people than what Paananen and
his colleagues did after their hugely lucrative sale to SoftBank.
After celebrating, they announced publicly that they planned
to forgo any of the accounting tricks usually employed by the
wealthy to minimize their tax burden. When the time came,
Paananen paid $69 million in taxes, out of his 2013 income of
$215 million, a tax rate of 32 percent. (Capital gains are taxed
at a lower rate than wages in Finland too.) Most Americans
in a similar situation—­Warren Buffett aside—­would probably think Paananen and his colleagues fools for letting the
government take so much of their money without a fight. But
Paananen’s view of the matter was clear. They had gotten so
much from their society—­the same fair chance to succeed in
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the first place that all Nordics get, plus start-­up funding and a
steady pool of well-­educated talent—­that it was their turn to
pay back. For them the ability to pay so much back was part of
the success, and it felt good.
To be sure, Nordic countries have less noble members of the
elite who try every trick in the book to avoid paying taxes, even
going so far as to establish residence in other countries. But the
civic-­minded attitude of Paananen and his colleagues at Supercell is hardly unique.
Listening to Paananen, I thought of another successful
Nordic entrepreneur I had spoken with earlier, the executive
chairman and co-­owner of the Swedish fashion brand Acne Studios, a man named Mikael Schiller. Acne’s edgy apparel is sold
around the world, and its influence on the young and trendy
outstrips its size. The founders draw inspiration from American icons like Andy Warhol’s Factory, while they themselves
have perfected the skill of behaving like artists while making
impressive amounts of money—­the Wall Street Journal titled an
article about them “How to Succeed in Fashion Without Trying
Too Hard.” For example, Acne shies away from advertising but
publishes its own artsy magazine. Like Paananen, Schiller felt
that it was the all-­important job of government to provide the
basic social infrastructure of good education, health care, roads,
broadband, and so on. “That leaves us free to build our company around other values than just money,” Schiller said when
I met him at his company’s stylish headquarters in a historic
building in Stockholm’s quaint Old Town. “In taxes, as in everything, simplicity is the key. Everyone should know what they
are expected to do, and the rules shouldn’t change all the time.”
In terms of fairness, both Schiller and Paananen said, companies may be harming themselves if the owners of the companies are paying taxes at a lower rate than the managers they hire,
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as it undermines morale and is bad for the business. Both also
said, independently, that they’d prefer greater fairness in taxes,
even if it meant that their own personal tax rate would rise.
Not everyone is as positive as Paananen and Schiller when it
comes to evaluating the role of the entrepreneur in the Nordic
region. In Finland business­people in more traditional industries
complain about the high costs of employing workers, and many
entrepreneurs pine for the lower tax rates in Finland’s next-­door
neighbor Estonia. Regular grievances include the perceived
difficulty of firing ­people, union power, government bureaucracy, and of course taxes. But what Paananen was saying is
undeniably true. While there is always room for improvement,
the Nordic model does not stifle innovation or entrepreneurial
spirit, it drives it.
In fact, history has proved that beyond a doubt.
I N N OVAT I O N I N T H E AG E O F H A P P Y FA M I L I E S
Companies and brands founded and run by Nordic citizens are
famous all over the world. Think of such Swedish companies
as Ikea, H&M, Spotify, Volvo, Ericsson, or Tetra Pak, the ubiquitous food-­packaging company. Denmark has LEGO, Carlsberg, the shipping and energy giant Maersk, and one of the
world’s largest pharmaceutical companies, Novo Nordisk. The
Internet video-­chat company Skype was cofounded by a Swede
and a Dane with the help of Estonian engineers. Finland is not
far behind. The Finnish company Nokia was the world’s largest mobile phone company for more than a decade—­and, for
a while, the largest company by market capitalization in all of
Europe. Today Finland boasts companies such as KONE, one
of the largest elevator manufacturers in the world, with 47,000
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employees. KONE isn’t just a manufacturing behemoth; it’s
also a high-­tech innovator whose products are enabling the
construction of new, record-­setting skyscrapers a kilometer
tall—­3,300 feet, twice the height of the Empire State Building.
Finnish pulp and paper manufacturers such as Stora Enso and
UPM operate all over the world. Newer players like Supercell and Rovio or Sweden’s Mojang, the publisher of the hugely
popular video game Minecraft (which Microsoft bought in 2014
for $2.5 billion), have been changing the face of online gaming.
In fashion, small but influential companies such as Acne Studios, Denmark’s Malene Birger, and Finland’s Marimekko
have stores and followers all over the world. Nordic design,
furniture, and architecture are lauded around the globe, not
to mention the recent huge popularity of Nordic crime novels
and TV shows.
Nordic nations have produced what is, by any metric, an
impressive quantity of successful international businesses and
brands, especially for such small, out-­of-­the-­way countries. As
in any region, some Nordic companies eventually crash and
burn, and others never get off the ground. Some continue to
dominate their market for decades. This is all as it should be
in a free-­market, capitalist economy. But one thing is clear: Allowing employees to combine work and family, ensuring high-­
quality universal education, providing health care for all and
day care for every child, and curbing income inequality have not
destroyed the capacity for innovation, nor have they prevented
Nordic individuals from building business empires, and in the
process becoming wealthy, some enormously so.
When the World Bank ranks countries on ease of doing
business, based on criteria such as starting a company, dealing
with construction permits, getting credit, trading across borders, enforcing contracts, or paying taxes, the Nordic countries
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consistently rank among the most business-­friendly nations in
the world. In fact, on those criteria, American entrepreneurs
would be better off in Denmark, which scored higher than the
United States in the 2015 ranking. Sweden, Norway, and Finland followed closely, in the top ten.
The reasons for all this Nordic success in business are, once
again, not complicated. They result from deliberate policy
choices inspired by the fundamental values and goals of the
Nordic theory of love: making sure that families are composed
of strong and independent individuals who function well as a
team, that workers are healthy and well educated and not overly
dependent on their employers, that infrastructure is top-­notch,
that institutions are transparent, that the justice system works in
the public interest, that corruption is low, that technology permeates society, that trade is free, that regulations are reasonable.
Another way of saying all this is that the Nordic nations have
cultivated the single most valuable resource a society can have in
the twenty-­first century: human capital. That dynamism, innovation, and prosperity result should come as no surprise.
In fact the Nordic model goes to extraordinary lengths to
support entrepreneurs, whether all Nordic entrepreneurs recognize that or not. At the most basic level the Nordic approach
reduces the risk of starting a company, since basic ser­vices such
as education and health care are covered for entrepreneurs and
their families regardless of the fledgling company’s fate. And
if the entrepreneur succeeds, he or she is rewarded by tax rates
on capital gains that are lower than the rate on wages. It’s true
that entrepreneurs who hire employees in the Nordic countries
face more protections for those employees than in the United
States, making the firing of individual workers more difficult
and guaranteeing some basic rights for all, including parental
leaves and higher employer contributions to employees’ social
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security. But in these cases it’s once again the United States that
is just way behind almost every other modern nation in affording workers basic protections. When the OECD compares
countries on the ease of laying off employees, the United States
stands alone as the one nation where, on most metrics, workers can be fired with the least consideration whatsoever. Nordic
companies also have the advantage of being able to hire workers
for trial periods—­several months, or even half a year—­while
retaining the right to fire them for any reason during that time.
What about other difficulties that entrepreneurs and companies in the Nordic countries supposedly face, compared with
the United States? It’s true that Nordic labor unions are strong,
but their relations with employers are mostly collaborative and
civil. Unions and employers have traditionally negotiated labor
contracts with their mutual interests in mind: that employers
share the wealth with employees, in return for stable production schedules free from strikes or other problems. So what do
the results of these negotiations look like—­is treating workers
fairly bad for business?
In recent years labor activists have been fighting to raise the
American minimum wage from the federal $7.25 per hour to
$15. At the center of this fight sits the fast-­food industry, where
workers typically earn wages barely above the legal minimum.
The Nordic countries don’t have national minimum wages;
instead minimum levels are set by collective-­bargaining agreements that all employers must adhere to. The result is that in
Denmark, for example, fast-­food restaurants pay their workers
the equivalent of twenty dollars per hour. In Finland the average wage for a McDonald’s worker was about fourteen dollars
per hour in 2014. Not only that, fast-­food chains in the Nordic
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countries must give their workers the same paid vacations and
generous paid parental leaves as all other companies.
And what is the horrible cost to consumers of all this? A
Big Mac in Denmark costs about a dollar more than one in the
United States. In 2015 the Finnish and American Big Macs cost
exactly the same. Surely this state of affairs must have crushed
the Nordic fast-­food business by now? On the contrary, all the
Nordic countries have thriving fast-­food industries, from McDonald’s on down to local chains. From the Nordic perspective, it’s not this Nordic approach that is unsustainable—­it’s the
American approach that’s eventually going to implode. For in
the United States more than half of fast-­food workers rely on
some form of public assistance to get by, meaning that American taxpayers are actually subsidizing the fast-­food industry
in the United States, to the tune of billions of dollars per year.
If we’re hunting for countries practicing socialism, the United
States appears to be a pretty strong contender.
Still, it’s often hard for Americans to understand how you
can run a competitive business if many of your employees are
at any given time working shorter hours, on vacation, or taking
their parental leaves, especially outside the admittedly unique
world of billion-­dollar start-­ups like Supercell.
Are there challenges for Nordic companies? Sure. But with
some clever organizing and a premium on efficiency, remaining competitive is not that difficult. Just ask the p­ eople who are
doing it.
The headquarters of Denmark’s Novo Nordisk, the world’s
largest insulin maker, with forty thousand employees in
seventy-­five countries, is tucked in a low-­lying industrial park
outside Copenhagen. The place looks unimpressive from the
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outside, but on the inside the lobby is shiny white and sleek,
with curved, high tables and bowls of fruit for guests to nibble
on as they wait. When I sat down with the company’s senior vice
president of HR at the time, Lars Chris­tian Lassen, an assistant
brought in a truly Danish lunch of smørrebrød—­open-­faced rye
sandwiches—­topped with gravlax and egg. I had come to ask
one question of Lassen: How is it possible that a company like
Novo Nordisk can compete against the famously dynamic and
profitable pharmaceutical companies of the United States, considering that a Danish company must surely be burdened, to
some degree, by the generosity the state requires it to give its
employees?
“It is a challenge, but it can be done,” answered Lassen, a
lively man with thick, whimsical eyebrows and unruly hair. He
believes that Nordic workers’ commitment and independence
make up for the time they are away on their various leaves. “I
think that when our employees are at work,” Lassen told me,
“they want to deliver.” He also thinks the company gains from
being perceived as a desirable employer. He should know. He
originally came to Novo Nordisk on a six-­month research leave
from his post at Copenhagen University, after completing his
PhD in medicine. He ended up staying. When we met he had
worked at the company for twenty years.
Lassen himself could easily leave the office at four o’clock
if it was his turn to get dinner ready for his sons—­as with most
Nordic ­couples, his wife works as well. He would, however,
catch up with work after dinner if needed. And while employees’ long parental leaves do pose challenges for a company, not
to mention to an individual’s career, they do not prohibit business or innovation. One year of leave is actually easier to arrange
than shorter stretches, Lassen said. It’s not hard to hire someone
else to cover a post for a whole year—­especially since Nordic
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companies are not responsible for paying the absent employee’s
salary, since parental leaves are funded through taxes. As long as
leaves are announced early enough, companies can plan for the
future knowing exactly when their employees will return—­and
that they indeed will return, which is not always the case for
women after their American maternity leaves, which are almost
always too short.
“We don’t measure p­ eople on their presence in the office,
we measure them on the outcomes,” Lassen said. “This is a
company where p­ eople don’t get fired because they leave at
four o’clock to pick up the kids. They get fired if they don’t
deliver.”
I heard similar sentiments from other business managers
across the Nordic region. A Finnish woman I know named
Veera Sylvius has a particularly high-­pressure job. She’s the
CEO and co-­owner of a company called Space Systems Finland, which performs a c­ouple of extremely important tasks:
writing software that runs satellites, and checking electronic
safety systems for nuclear power plants, trains, and other heavy
high-­tech machinery. The company employs about seventy-five
­people from several countries and serves clients not just across
Europe but in the United States as well. At any given time, she
told me, a number of her employees, both men and women, are
on parental leave or taking care of sick kids at home. Some take
off a few days, others a month, and yet others a year. All are
highly educated engineers, physicists, or software developers.
Yet Sylvius didn’t think their leaves threatened her ability to
run a successful business.
“Having children and running your life outside of work
is so important that ­people should be allowed to do it,” she
said. “Some employers claim that parental leaves are too much
of a burden on companies, but I don’t think that’s true. Your
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business has to be in good-­enough shape that it’s not going to
crumble just because someone is taking care of their children. If
your business can’t handle that, then you have a problem with
either your business model or your management.”
Sylvius herself has two children, and took about year and a
half of parental leave for each. Her husband, who also works in
the software industry, took care of their firstborn for another six
months after she returned to work. Both she and her husband
continue to have demanding and flourishing careers.
In Denmark, social policies have evolved further to help
companies like Novo Nordisk remain competitive globally,
while still protecting the rights of workers. Denmark’s innovative “flexicurity” system makes hiring and firing p­ eople relatively easy, while at the same time guaranteeing up to two years
of good unemployment payments for those who get fired, along
with job retraining and placement assistance. Novo Nordisk’s
Lassen was frank about the costs and benefits of this approach
to his company. “We pay a lot of taxes,” he acknowledged, “but
part of those taxes ensures that there is basic coverage for ­people
who are unemployed. This is the social contract we have with
labor unions, if you like.”
When it comes to hiring foreign talent, the Nordic system
can be an asset or an obstacle. Some foreigners balk at paying
Denmark’s high taxes, although the country allows foreign researchers and key employees to pay reduced taxes for several
years. But the safe, relaxed, and family-­friendly lifestyle in the
Nordic countries can also be a big draw. Nordic executives earn
less than their peers in other countries, but they are not rushing to get jobs abroad. It seems that most of them value a high
quality of life over additional boosts in pay. There are, of course,
notable exceptions. One of the most famous Nordic tax refugees is the founder of Ikea, Ingvar Kamprad, who fled Swedish
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taxes by moving to Switzerland in the 1970s, though he finally
returned to Sweden in 2013.
Lassen also noted that Nordic social policies, because of the
foundation of stability they provide, can actually encourage employees to take risks that lead to innovation. Workers, like entrepreneurs, can try out a new approach when the risk of ending
up on the street is practically zero. Innovation can come from
many types of environments. Obviously American companies
are world leaders in innovation, which indicates that innovation doesn’t necessarily require great employee benefits—­even
though one might note that Silicon Valley giants and pharmaceutical companies are known for their outstanding employee
benefits, even in the United States. But when it comes to innovation Nordic companies are not far behind, which proves that
a more humane pace, and flexible work practices, nurture it just
as well.
The flexibility that Nordic workers enjoy goes beyond even
what’s envisioned by experts in the United States who advocate
for more flexibility in the workplace. Swedes and Norwegians,
in particular, have tremendous freedom, even more than Finns.
It’s almost dizzying to try to understand their work schedules. Swedish parents of children born before 2014 get to share
and use 480 days of paid parental leave (approximately sixteen
months) at any time in almost any increments until the child
turns eight. The rules have since changed a bit, and today new
parents can use their 480 days at any time before the child turns
four, and a fifth of the days can be used until the child turns
twelve. Both parents have to use at least two months or they
lose that portion of the benefits. Most of my Swedish acquaintances have divided their parental leave days over several years
by working only two or three days a week, or by taking a month
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off for several winters on top of their normal vacation time, or
dividing the days in various combinations between the spouses
instead of taking all the days in a row during the child’s first
years. They have to announce the leave they wish to take two
or three months in advance, but if they do that, their employer
can’t deny them the leave.
How is it possible to run a company like that, I asked Kristin
Heinonen, a Swedish acquaintance who at the time managed
a small digital design company. “It’s not really a problem,” she
said. She thought about it for a moment. “It’s so ingrained in the
culture here. In my company it usually works out well, so that
as someone is coming back from a leave, another one is taking
theirs. Sometimes it’s also useful, like during the recent downturn when we had less work. A ­couple of my coworkers happened to be on partial or full parental leave at the time, and it
was convenient since the company didn’t have as large expenses
for salaries as usual.”
Americans are generally more productive in terms of GDP
per hour worked, but Denmark and Sweden come very close
to the United States in efficiency. (Norway, with its oil, is even
more productive than the United States by this measure.) Finland, I’m a little embarrassed to admit, is the least efficient of
the group. In some ways, however, the American view that
working less is automatically a sign of laziness and inefficiency
is misguided. When a company or a country does well and there
is more wealth to share, workers can take their cut in either
money or free time. Nordic workers often prefer to take time
over money, because at a certain point, the secret Nordic p­ eople
know is that time off buys you a better quality of life than more
cash. Those four or five glorious weeks of paid summer vacations that p­ eople in the Nordic countries enjoy really just mean
that the employer is spreading eleven months of pay over twelve.
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From the point of view of employers, having employees
who prefer free time to money can admittedly be problematic. It
requires more effort to organize the work if you have to divide
it between more ­people working irregular hours. And in some
professions, workers become better at what they do the more
they do it, so one person working longer hours is preferable to
two ­people working part-­time. This is especially true in fields
that require extensive training or unusual talent. In the Nordic
countries, where university education is free, it would certainly
be a more efficient use of taxpayer dollars to educate just one
doctor to work full-­time, rather than two to work part-­time.
However, Nordic experience shows that in most fields, workers’
skills aren’t so specialized that finding adequate substitutes is
difficult. And in some jobs, it might in fact be more efficient to
have multiple workers work fewer hours, if the work requires
concentration that inevitably ebbs after a certain number of
hours per employee.
Having a flexible workplace can even benefit the company.
In a 2012 interview, Jeanette Skijle, H&M’s human resources
chief, told the Wall Street Journal that H&M sees parental leave-­
taking as an opportunity for its employees to try out different
positions within the company and develop new skills. All H&M
employees have a person appointed to take on their job when
they go on leave. She concluded that while ­people themselves
might think they’re irreplaceable, in reality nobody is. Summer
vacations and parental leaves are a great opportunity for students or others looking to get a foot in the door to show what
they can do. For employers these substitutions function as test-­
drives of new and old employees’ talents, and of their ability to
grow.
All this works best when every company has to do it. When
more businesses are asked to adopt flexible practices, the cost to
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any one firm is lowered—­something that has even been noted in
the United States, in the 2013 Economic Report of the President,
put out by the White House: “An individual employer may be
less likely to offer flexible work schedules when other firms
have not adopted the same practice out of the fear that it will attract less committed workers.” That is precisely why the Nordic
countries make these practices a matter of national policy, rather
than leaving them up to individual companies—­doing so is
better overall for the companies. The Nordic approach protects
the individual first, on the grounds that stronger individuals
will build stronger companies, but it also protects the employers
by instituting the same guidelines for all.
Studies have shown that a flexible, family-­friendly workplace can motivate current staff, reduce staff turnover, help attract new staff, reduce workplace stress, and generally enhance
worker satisfaction and productivity. An OECD report noted
that companies that have introduced family-­friendly measures
often report significant reductions in staff turnover, absenteeism, and an increased likelihood that mothers return to the
original employer after their maternity leave. Another study
concluded that the United States could increase its productivity by offering all women fifteen weeks of paid maternity leave.
The World Economic Forum has found that family-­friendly
policies can increase innovation by promoting a diverse workplace that includes more women. Overall, offering employees
enough vacation and sick days to reduce stress, allow them to
catch up on sleep, and improve their health have all been found
to boost productivity as well as to save businesses money, in addition to adhering to common sense and contributing to the general quality of life. But none of this will happen automatically.
As a Europe-­wide study on gender equality in the workplace
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showed, in many cases companies can continue to get by and
extract profits without offering their employees better work-­life
balance. This means that if a society wants its members—­and its
companies—­to thrive with such benefits, laws are still required
to help all businesses adopt these improvements together, at the
same time.
The reason for setting up such requirements is simple, and
Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren put it eloquently:
“There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own.
Nobody. You built a factory out there, good for you. But, I want
to be clear: you moved your goods to market on the roads the
rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate. You were safe in your factory because of police forces and
fire forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn’t have to worry
that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your
factory and hire someone to protect against this because of the
work the rest of us did. Now look, you built a factory and it
turned into something terrific or a great idea. God bless. Keep a
big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is you
take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes
along.”
Contrary to American assumptions, what Nordics refer to as
their “well-­being state” is not a system that kills innovation,
competitiveness, or the American dream—­that classic aspiration for upward social mobility and dynamic success. Americans
toil away on an endless treadmill, virtually as servants of their
employers, told that this is the only way to stay competitive. Yet
their Nordic counterparts have the freedom to succeed professionally, contributing to the competitive advantage of their employers and their nation, while also enjoying life outside work.
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Nordic businesses still remain innovative and globally competitive, benefiting from the standards set by the well-­being state
rather than being crippled by them.
Across the most important areas of life—­family, work, education, health, love, money—­­people in Nordic societies enjoy
forms of individualism, freedom, social mobility, and independence from societal obligations that are more quintessentially
American than what Americans themselves today are generally
able to experience. For the United States, in turn, to borrow ideas
from the current successes of Nordic societies is not only workable and appropriate, but in fact could result in a restoration,
and reinvigoration, of the most basic ideals that have defined
the nation. Indeed, studying the Nordic model is an opportunity
to pursue a deeper and more profound level of American-­style
individualism. All it requires is showing a little bit of faith in us,
the human beings involved.
THE HUMAN SPIRIT
Americans believe, more than any other nation, in every individual’s ability to craft his or her own fate. Getting rich is part of
the American dream, of course, but Americans have also shown
that they’re motivated by loftier ideals. They have a special affection for selfless heroes and acts of charity—­for those individuals who put the survival, well-­being, and happiness of others
ahead of their own. I have found myself deeply affected and inspired by the contagious, energetic, and self-­motivated manner
in which Americans from all walks of life kick off projects to
improve the circumstances of ­people in their own community
as well as on the other side of the world, without counting the
hours or expecting financial rewards in return. But when it
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comes to social and economic policy, Americans suddenly seem
to lose all faith in the human spirit.
The iconic American defender of libertarian ideals and self-­
interest, Ayn Rand, the author of The Fountainhead and Atlas
Shrugged, experienced firsthand the most virulent and destructive form of socialism, in the Soviet Union. Under communism-­
inspired totalitarianism, ­people did lose their incentive to work,
because all independence and individual agency were taken
away from them. But the United States and the Nordic countries today are all free-­market capitalist democracies. In this
context concerns that providing citizens with generous ser­vices
and workers with generous rights, and asking the successful to
pay their share, will take away p­ eople’s incentive to work represent a sad misjudgment of human nature.
We’ve seen how successful Nordic businesses are, and to be
sure, in the Nordic private sector, the desire to make money is a
powerful motivator. But Nordic societies are also leading innovators in the public and nonprofit arena, which has contributed
to their dynamic competitiveness and prosperity as well. The
creativity and ambition of Nordic government and nonprofit
sectors are living proof that p­ eople in a capitalist democracy can
be motivated by much more than simple greed.
Consider Denmark again, a country that is pursuing the
world’s most ambitious engineering solution to address climate
change. Copenhagen has set a goal of becoming carbon-­neutral by
as early as 2025, and has been installing an ultra-­high-­tech wireless network of smart streetlamps and traffic lights that themselves save energy and also help traffic move more efficiently,
reducing fuel consumption. All this is good for the environment,
the nonprofit public sector, and the private sector. By aiming to
wean itself as a nation off fossil fuels before 2050, for example,
Denmark has become a world leader in the wind-­power industry.
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Sweden, meanwhile, has set itself the ambitious goal of
completely eliminating deaths from traffic accidents, and in
the process is reinventing city planning, road building, traffic
rules, and the use of technology to make transport safer. The
country established the goal in 1997, and since then has reduced
road deaths by half. Today only three out of every one hundred thousand Swedes die on the roads each year, compared to
almost eleven in the United States. Consequently transportation
officials from around the world have started to seek Sweden’s
advice on traffic safety, and New York City mayor Bill de Blasio
has based his street safety plan on Sweden’s approach.
Of course one could also argue that the biggest Nordic innovation of all is the whole concept and execution of the well-­
being state.
Americans might be surprised, too, by the ways that some
of the key building blocks of the global technology sector have
been the result of nonprofit innovation. The core programming
code of Linux, for example—­the leading computer ­operating
system running on the world’s servers, mainframe computers,
and supercomputers—­was developed in Finland by a student
at Helsinki University, Linus Torvalds, who released it free of
charge as an open-­source application. When Torvalds later received some valuable stock options, they were a gift of gratitude
from some software developers. In addition Finns have made
other significant contributions to the global open-­source software movement, a community of coders who volunteer their
time and skills to create free software for anyone to use. One
of the world’s most popular open-­source databases, MySQL,
was created by a Finn named Monty Widenius and his Swedish partners. Today just about all American corporate giants—­
including Google, Facebook, Twitter, and Walmart—­rely on
MySQL. Widenius and his team have, in the years since, never-
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theless made good money, but they did so by providing support
and other ser­vices, while the software itself remains free to the
world.
Vying for global popularity with Nordic open-­source software has been another, quite different product of the Nordic
mind: the boom in so-­called Nordic noir—­crime novels and TV
shows. With their psychologically dark themes, they can tell us
something about the Nordic approach to creativity and innovation, too.
Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy of novels, starting with The
Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, have been massive international
best-­sellers—­made into both a Swedish movie and a Hollywood film starring Daniel Craig. Perhaps surprisingly, though,
Larsson himself did not set out to be a best-­selling author. For
decades he was a journalist and nonprofit researcher; his specialty was working for antiracist causes. He sold the trilogy only
shortly before his death. The books, which have been released
posthumously, derive their strength from Larsson’s deep sense
that the injustices of the world need rectifying.
As with Larsson, other pieces of Nordic noir that have
gained an international following have been made without the
primary incentive of profits. The Danish TV show The Killing,
an innovative crime drama that connects the mystery of a young
girl’s murder to local politics, weaves the tale into a touching
portrait of the anguish experienced by the victim’s family. In
the United States The Killing gained a passionate following as
a remake, while the British have fallen in love with the original Danish version. The show was produced by the Danish
Broadcasting Corporation, the Danes’ version of the BBC. In
recent years this broadcasting company—­DR, as it is called in
Danish—­has emerged as a powerhouse of high-­quality TV
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drama watched all over the world. None of DR’s success makes
sense, at least if you look at it from a typical American standpoint. That’s because DR, a public-­ser­vice company, doesn’t
have to compete, and isn’t required to turn a profit. It’s funded
by taxes—­specifically, by an annual media license fee that every
Danish household has to pay if they have a means of watching
TV.
Since DR’s worldwide success would seem to contradict
some basic American assumptions about what incentivizes corporations to produce top-­quality work, I wanted to find out
what, exactly, has motivated the man who created The Killing.
Søren Sveistrup, a tall man with a soldier’s frame and a clean-­
shaven head, met me in Copenhagen wearing a black denim
shirt and green cargo pants. He’d studied at Denmark’s film
school and tried his hand at writing movie scripts before being
recruited by DR. He’d always been an ardent fan, he told me,
of American movies and television shows—­Clint Eastwood’s
work had been particularly close to his heart. And Sveistrup felt
that the basic crime drama had been masterfully executed in the
United States. His own ambition had been to innovate on the
basic form, to elevate it by infusing it with a social critique—­a
long tradition in Nordic crime fiction.
Sveistrup was well aware that the budgets he works with in
Denmark are only a small fraction of those enjoyed by similar
British or American TV productions. But he thinks that Denmark, and DR, offer a different kind of advantage for someone looking to create an original TV show. “I think the Danish
system is very good. We get spoiled. Compared to the Americans, of course we do. The whole welfare nation stuff is fantastic,” Sveistrup said, referring to the general quality of life and
sense of security that even he, working in a risky industry, can
enjoy. “I think as a writer or just as an entrepreneur I have more
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possibilities in Denmark than I would have in other countries.
I’m very grateful for that. I think public funding can help artists
do something that they would not have done if they were by
themselves.”
When Sveistrup was working on The Killing, he received
a monthly salary as he researched and wrote the script, and,
typically for Nordics, he manages to mostly leave work early
enough to pick up his children from day care and eat dinner
with his family.
Again, from a certain American point of view, all this sounds
like it could be a recipe for disaster: a bunch of artists spending
taxpayer money for their pet projects without any accountability, not even to advertisers. Yet Sveistrup believes that while
different environments can enable different kinds of work, the
drive and ambition to create something extraordinary has, in
the end, little to do with the specific structure of the monetary
and material incentives involved, whether one is working in a
Nordic-­style well-­being nation or in the trenches of the most
brutal form of capitalism. The ambition, Sveistrup says, comes
from inside.
“My experience is that every good, dramatic story comes
from some kind of inner hunger or necessity to create it. If
you talk to writers or directors, it has to do with some kind of
misery. I don’t know any plain happy person who could create
something interesting,” Sveistrup said. “What makes you have
any kind of ambition, it’s grounded in your past, in your childhood, in your youth. You took a bite of the apple, or maybe you
didn’t get the apple, or maybe you’re trying to get attention, or
re-­create something that you lost. That aspect has nothing to do
with the welfare state. That’s the universal drive for a creative
life. And if you’re just happy, you have absolutely nothing to
write about.”
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I smiled when Sveistrup said this, because it struck me as a
very Nordic thing to say. Despite the fact that Nordic countries
score top marks in practically every global ranking of quality of
life and happiness, Nordic ­people can still be very somber folks.
And it occurred to me that perhaps exactly what Sveistrup was
saying was part of the secret of Nordic success. The creation of
the Nordic well-being society has made life much more comfortable for all Nordic citizens, but they are still motivated by
the drive to create, to achieve status and power, and to acquire
money, just like all other humans. And yet at the same time,
maybe the Nordic experience also reminds us that the human
desire to excel isn’t as fragile and weak as the American faith in
the profit motive might suggest. Maybe there’s more to life than
money, even in America.
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NINE
THE PURSUIT OF
HAPPINESS
I T ’ S T I M E TO
RETHINK SUCCESS
O N N OT B E I N G S P E C I A L
On June 1, 2012, David McCullough Jr. stepped up to the podium
in front of the graduating class at Wellesley High School in Massachusetts to deliver a now-­famous commencement speech. McCullough, one of the school’s English teachers and the son of the
Pulitzer Prize–winning historian David McCullough, looked
the part: a kind and inspiring educator who makes a difference
in the lives of his students. His temples showed a little gray, and
his reading glasses sat low on his nose as he gazed over them at
the sea of young people in the audience, arrayed in the sun in
their caps and gowns, eager to hear his message.
McCullough warmed up the audience with a few amusing
remarks. But only a few minutes into the speech, it seemed he
was suddenly getting off message. “Normally, I avoid clichés
like the plague, wouldn’t touch them with a ten-­foot pole, but
here we are on a literal level playing field,” McCullough said,
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referring to the school’s football field, the venue for the event.
“That matters. That says something. And your ceremonial
costume—­shapeless, uniform, one-­size-­fits-­all. Whether male
or female, tall or short, scholar or slacker, spray-­tanned prom
queen or intergalactic X-­Box assassin, each of you is dressed,
you’ll notice, exactly the same. And your diploma—­but for your
name, exactly the same. All of this is as it should be, because
none of you is special.”
In America this sounded like heresy. The video of the
speech went viral, sparking a media storm. McCullough’s detractors complained that he was being overly negative on a day
that should celebrate the promise of the graduates. He did have
his supporters, and they tended to express relief; finally someone was telling the truth to a generation of narcissistic, spoiled,
overprotected youth.
In a sense with his speech McCullough was taking aim at
one of America’s most cherished beliefs. The way that America allows, even expects, everyone to be special—­to be different,
to excel, and to pursue his or her own unique vision of happiness and success—­is one of the great things about the country.
Americans aren’t the only ones who cherish this ideal; outsiders
admire it as well. Many a Nordic citizen gazes at America with
envy, wishing his or her uniqueness could be celebrated the way
it would be in the United States. For in the Nordic countries,
while autonomy is highly valued, no one is considered special,
and no one is expected to be special. When I watched the video
of McCullough’s speech, I had only one cheerful thought: That
dude’s Finnish!
Having lived in the United States for a while now, I can see
more clearly many of America’s strengths, as well as some of the
Nordic region’s faults. The Nordic tendency to downplay the
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unique talents of each person as well as his or her unique pursuit
of happiness and success can be petty and disheartening. Downplaying specialness is so deeply ingrained and pervasive that the
Scandinavians—­that is, the Swedes, Danes, and Norwegians—­
even have a literary phrase to describe this tendency.
The phrase is “the Law of Jante,” and it is shorthand for a list
of ten commandments created by the Danish-­Norwegian writer
Aksel Sandemose in his 1933 novel A Fugitive Crosses His Tracks.
Sandemose’s ten commandments referred to the mentality of a
fictional town called Jante, but the rules were immediately understood to capture the larger disposition of Scandinavians in
general. The commandments are:
1. You are not to think you are anything special.
2. You are not to think you are as good as we are.
3. You are not to think you are smarter than we are.
4. You are not to convince yourself that you are better
than we are.
5. You are not to think you know more than we do.
6. You are not to think you are more important than
we are.
7. You are not to think you are good at anything.
8. You are not to laugh at us.
9. You are not to think anyone cares about you.
10. You are not to think you can teach us anything.
The actual commandments are less known in Finland, but
Finns certainly recognize the sentiment. It’s not that Nordics are
proud of their Law of Jante, mind you. More than anything, the
commandments are meant as a critique of a rather sad aspect of
the Nordic character that is often taken too far. Efforts to stand
apart from the crowd, or even to display self-­confidence, can
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strike ­people steeped in the Nordic tradition as egotism or narcissism. Successful Finns have been to known to feel that other
Finns are jealous or disparaging of their achievements. Moreover, sometimes Finns betray a distasteful fondness for schadenfreude when a successful person falters.
The Nordic habit of conformity can be particularly hard on
immigrants. Sweden is widely admired for its generous immigration policy, but on the whole many immigrants to the Nordic
region find its citizens cold, hostile, and closed-­minded. Often
this impression is well-­founded, although sometimes it is a misunderstanding. A Nordic person can seem reserved and distant
to those from other cultures even when that person intends no
malice or prejudice. That said, the Nordic impulse toward conformity can be so deeply ingrained, and Nordic norms can be so
completely taken for granted, that Nordic ­people may not realize how alienating they can be to p­ eople from other cultures. (Of
course Nordic norms can be restricting to Nordics themselves
as well.)
The positive side of all this belittling of one’s achievements or
specialness is the worldview it conveys: one charmingly devoid
of pomposity, and full of acknowledgment that we’re all just
humans here, regardless of our possibly successful actions. But if
the pressure to conform and denigrate oneself is so oppressively
present in Nordic societies, is it really possible for Nordic p­ eople
to be happy? Can the Nordic countries truly claim to be lands of
individualism, independence, freedom, and opportunity, if they
force everyone to be a clone of everyone else? Surely the United
States, even with its faults, is a place much more conducive to
fostering human happiness, and to celebrating individual liberty and success?
In some ways I think that’s true. While I find much room
for improvement in America’s social structures, I love Ameri-
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cans and their approach to life. They are the most helpful, energetic, and supportive ­people I’ve ever met. I admire the way
Americans encourage one another in all endeavors and find
ways to turn their ideas into action. American society is truly diverse, and while the United States struggles with its own issues
of inequality and racism, for someone like me to live among a
sea of ­people from all backgrounds has been an exhilarating and
life-­altering experience. That diversity and positive energy are
what makes me want to be an American.
But here’s the thing: What makes Nordic p­ eople uncomfortable is when “uniqueness” or “being special” includes the
suggestion that certain p­ eople are more valuable than others.
Americans and Nordics may start from a similar point, and
acknowledge each individual’s inherent value. But Americans
tend to emphasize an individual’s capacity for extraordinary
achievement, and then focus on celebrating those who fulfill this
promise. This makes Americans comfortable with hierarchies
based on income, title, or other indicators of status, because these
hierarchies are perceived as being based on merit. By contrast
Nordics tend to continue emphasizing the equal value of each
individual regardless of his or her achievements, and thus Nordic
­people dislike such hierarchies and celebrations of success.
What’s behind this difference in attitudes? Today Americans still feel that by and large, every individual is responsible for constructing his or her own fate—­the classic pursuit of
happiness—­and there is still much debate in the United States
about the extent to which, if at all, an individual’s success or
failure is also shaped by accidents of birth. Nordic ­people have
long ago moved beyond this debate. To most Nordics it’s completely obvious that an accident of birth, like being born into
poverty or a neighborhood without a good school, can severely
­disadvantage an individual and destroy any chances of success,
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no matter what he or she does. And vice versa: If you are born
into wealth or a neighborhood with a much better school, obviously you are going to have a better chance at doing well. If you
agree with this view, then every individual’s success is also partly
thanks to factors not of his or her own creation. As such, when
one does succeed, one can certainly take pride in that, but there
is less cause to feel overimpressed with one’s own achievements,
or be awed by the success of others. Other ­people helped make it
possible, and more often than not, luck also played a part.
I’d be the first to agree that the Nordic attitudes described
by the Law of Jante are outdated, and that p­ eople should have
the freedom to be who they are, and to pursue their dreams,
without pressure to be just like everyone else. Everyone should
absolutely have the freedom to be openly proud of their achievements, especially when society has created truly equal opportunities for everyone. After all, it is exactly because of that equity
that every individual can feel good about their success and the
degree to which it is due to their own personal efforts, instead
of, say, their parents’ wealth or connections.
To take the idea of individual autonomy to its logical conclusion, Nordics would do well to be more supportive of different choices, and to allow their citizens to pursue happiness
in different ways. While the structures of Nordic society do an
excellent job at supporting ­people’s autonomy and well-being,
Nordic culture could do better at accepting variety and idiosyncrasy.
Meanwhile, though, McCullough’s “You Are Not Special”
speech had clearly hit a nerve in America, and many Americans
themselves were wondering if all the cosseting, nudging, cajoling, wheedling, and fawning over every individual’s potential to
achieve exceptional success, and all the attendant striving, were
actually resulting in anyone achieving happiness.
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In fact, maybe what is needed in America is a complete rethinking of the entire definition of success.
TO AC H I E V E O R TO B E ?
American newspapers and magazines are full of stories of entrepreneurs, executives, athletes, and all kinds of whiz kids
doing exceptional things. For me these stories are sources of
both anxiety and excitement. On my best days I devour them
hungrily, and they fill me with encouragement. Back in Finland I seldom encountered stories of such inspiring examples,
which might help explain why Finns have the worst collective
self-­esteem of any nation I know. Go to Italy or Spain, and the
locals can’t stop telling you how great their own food, weather,
scenery, or ­people are. Go to France, and you’ll hear all about its
cuisine, history, and literary heritage. Come to America, and it’ll
be made clear to you that the United States is the best country in
the world. Go to Finland, and you’ll be asked why you bothered
to come.
So perhaps it was somewhat Finnish of me that when I sat
at my kitchen table in New York, trying to feel inspired by the
stories in newspapers and magazines about American superachievers, sometimes I ended up feeling discouraged. Sure, I
had always applied myself to my work tenaciously, and sometimes even creatively, but I love to sleep, watch TV, read, hang
out with my family and friends, and lie around in my pajamas
eating chocolate. I dislike competition, rushing to get things
done, full schedules, and too much exercise. Just hearing about
the incredibly busy, fast, athletic, confident, and successful
­people who accomplish astonishing numbers of things every
single day in America drains the life out of me. Their mere
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e­ xistence, combined with the praise they receive, seems to reproach my whole being.
In America being average is not good enough. Parents
keep telling their children they are special, no doubt out of
love and a sincere belief that their children are indeed special.
But for the children trying to live up to all this, such expectations can be a source of stress and pressure, especially if their
achievements later in life fail to match the all-­powerful self-­
image their parents instilled in them. As adults, what we’re all
supposed to do in America is overcome limits, get out of the
comfort zone, push the envelope, and reach for more, more,
always more. While this approach has accelerated progress and
contributed to the lives of everyone on earth today, being satisfied with what one has, by contrast, is often considered unambitious, even lazy.
As I absorbed the daily diet of American superachieving
going on around me, I noticed a change in the way I thought
about work. In Finland I had always wanted my job to be
meaningful, and I had willingly put in long hours at the newspapers and magazines I worked for, even working weekends
when necessary. At the same time I considered work just work,
and life something that happened outside of work. Life was
dinners with friends, long vacations, riding, swimming in lakes,
spending time with family. I distinctly remember feeling sorry
for Americans who didn’t seem to know what to do with themselves on vacation, or who didn’t even take any vacations. In my
eyes at the time, these Americans had become enslaved to work
and forgotten what life is really about.
In the United States I listened to Americans talk about passion for what you do, and even though the American rhetoric
can sound hyperbolic to a Finn, slowly I began to understand it.
Work can be something that you genuinely love, and not just
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something you do in order to have a life. Work itself can be a
source of happiness, and not just a means to pay for the things
that make you happy. When you see it that way, you don’t have
to be constantly waiting for the weekend or vacation, as many
Finns do. But while I’ve come to appreciate the American way
of seeing work as a source of energy and satisfaction, there are
some enormous problems with the American approach to pursuing success today. These problems are undermining happiness
in America and even ruining p­ eople’s health and lives. What
isn’t so obvious are the ways that the Nordic theory of love sheds
new light on these problems, too.
In a national survey Americans were asked to define the components of a successful life. They prioritized good health, a good
marriage or relationship, knowing how to spend money wisely,
a good balance between work and personal life, and having a job
you love. Having a lot of money was rated very low—­at twentieth place on a list of twenty-­two contributors to a successful
life. In another study the attributes parents most wanted to pass
on to their children included honesty and truthfulness, reliability, closeness with family, and good education. They also hoped
their children would work hard and become financially independent. But becoming powerful and influential was among the
least-­valued future scenarios.
And what about young ­people themselves? In another national survey Harvard researchers asked young Americans what
was most important to them. Surprisingly, almost 80 percent of
youth reported answers that seemed completely at odds with
the selfless values that parents had reported wanting to teach
their children. The young ­people picked high personal achievement or happiness as their top choice. They ranked the sort of
less selfish goals that their parents reported trying to teach them
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lower, including fairness and caring for others. The vast majority of the youngsters also reported opinions about their parents that seemed to contradict completely what parents had said
about themselves; children said they believed their parents’ top
priorities were also selfish goals like achievement and personal
happiness. What explains this startling disconnect between the
values American parents say they want to teach their kids, and
the values their children are actually learning?
There are two possibilities: American adults might be lying
when they talk about prioritizing compassion and love, since it
looks as if in reality they value wealth and power. Or they might
be telling the truth about their priorities, but something is forcing them to live against their own values in practice. Either way,
how is it that the actions of American adults could have become
so different from their words—­so different, in fact, that even
their own children get the wrong message? Why is the younger
generation growing up to feel that what matters is the relentless
and selfish quest to excel, to be special, to achieve?
Despite what parents say they want for their kids, the brutal
reality in America today is that being a special superachiever is,
more and more, the only way anyone can ensure a reasonably
successful life for themselves—­regardless of their core values.
Consider this comment from the American journalist Alina
Tugend: “Parents seem to be increasingly anxious that there
just isn’t going to be enough—­enough room at good colleges or
graduate schools or the top companies—­for even the straight-­A,
piano-­playing quarterback, and we end up convinced that being
average will doom our children to a life that will fall far short of
what we want for them.” While individual Americans might be
the most generous p­ eople in the world in their daily actions and
deepest desires, they are stuck in a society that ensures none of
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the fundamental opportunities that ­people need to achieve even
basic middle-­class comforts. This condemns Americans to an
anxiety-­ridden battle where a person had better be special, because the alternative is not succeeding at all. The United States
is remarkable among the advanced nations for the way it forces
its ­people into lives so stressful they may have to turn against
even their own values.
I once saw an ad in an American magazine for a financial
institution of some kind. It featured a woman galloping into
the distance on a beautiful horse, with her back to the viewer.
The caption read: “Money means being able to tell the world to
get lost.” When I lived in Finland, I wasn’t amassing significant
wealth, and yet I’d always felt perfectly free to tell the world to
get lost if I wanted to. I had five weeks of paid vacation every
year, and Finns don’t typically read their work e-­mails on vacation. I’d never felt I needed to acquire wealth and power to
ensure a successful and satisfying life. After I moved to America, I thought about the ad often. In the United States, to be able
to do the things that are really important to you, like spending
time with your family, offering your children a good education,
and ensuring your family’s health, you actually do need quite
substantial amounts of money. But it’s a catch-­22. Americans
who manage to build a career that earns them a lot of money
usually can’t take much time off. And if they have a job that
doesn’t demand so many hours, they don’t usually make much
money, which leads to constant anxiety, and often, the need to
take on another job.
At least one very special, highly successful, and exceptionally
wealthy American has given these problems some thought. The
founder of the Huffington Post, Arianna Huffington, wrote in
her recent book Thrive that Americans need a new definition of
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success. Rather than everyone working so hard, in Huffington’s
mind we should all strive for a healthier version of success that
includes greater attention to our own personal well-­being, the
cultivation of wisdom, the ability to wonder, and giving back.
When I heard this I cringed. Those are good goals for sure, and
Huffington’s heart seems to be in the right place. But the tools
she is offering are not going to solve the problem. What Americans need, so that they can stop struggling so hard to be superachievers, is simple: affordable high-­quality health care, day
care, education, living wages, and paid vacations. Studies show
that a majority of Americans would gladly work fewer hours
than they do now, and only a minority would like to have a job
with more responsibilities. It’s not that Americans don’t realize
that they need to relax, as Arianna Huffington seems to think.
It’s that they can’t afford to.
Still, we also have to admit that even when p­ eople get a basic
level of financial security and the chance to catch their breath,
happiness doesn’t necessarily follow. In fact researchers and
popular commentators often point to a strange paradox: P
­ eople
living in poverty or in other kinds of difficult circumstances
often exhibit a brighter outlook on life than ­people who seem
to have it all.
Indeed, just look at the difference between Americans and
Finns—­Americans ever the optimists, and Finns not so much.
When global surveys rank the grumpy Nordics as some of the
happiest ­people in the world, what does that even mean?
THE OPTIMISTS VS. THE PESSIMISTS
Sometimes when my American acquaintances hear me saying
good things about the Nordic countries, they ask me to explain
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something. If Finland is such a great place, why does it have such
a high suicide rate? Another way to ask that question is: What’s
the point of having great public ser­vices and well-­functioning
governments if ­people are unhappy? It’s an intriguing paradox:
Americans, of course, despite their insecurity and stressed-­out
lives, define themselves by their irrepressible optimism. Nordic
­people—­especially Finns—­feel secure and have a much higher
quality of life than Americans, yet are more frequently pessimists.
In many ways I love the positive thinking one finds in America. At its best it’s energizing and gratifying, and fills you with
a can-­do spirit. In Finland the way ­people grumble, and see
impossibilities instead of opportunities, can deflate everyone’s
energy, and even become a hindrance when a project needs to
move forward. My Finnish friends who’ve lived in the United
States and then returned to Finland find that one of the most
difficult things to bear back in Finland is the negativity. And yet,
looking from my perch in the United States back at the Nordic
region, I can’t help but also wonder whether the abundance of
positive thinking in America has a downside that’s just as deep.
America’s reign of optimism contributes to a culture in
which negative feelings are often unwelcome. Everyone from
a cancer patient to the unemployed and the downtrodden is
always expected to see the silver lining, envision a better future,
and express gratitude for whatever little they’ve got going for
them. So what’s wrong with that?
Negative feelings are often a necessary spark for progress.
Too much optimism can actually hinder ­people in the pursuit of
their goals. A professor of psychology at New York University
and the University of Hamburg named Gabriele Oettingen and
her colleagues have conducted studies that ask test subjects in
a variety of situations to engage in mental scenarios related to
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a goal. Women trying to lose weight, injured ­people hoping to
heal, and students aiming to get good grades, a date, or a job
were asked to imagine different outcomes for their quest. Later
researchers checked back to see what had happened. The more
optimistic each person had been about his or her outcomes,
the worse the results. As Oettingen explains, positive thinking
can fool our minds into perceiving that we’ve already attained
our goal, which slackens our readiness to pursue it. And it can
have other problematic effects. The best-­selling author Barbara
Ehrenreich, for one, has argued that the American gospel of
positive thinking contributed to the recent financial crisis, by
encouraging the poor to take on mortgages they couldn’t afford,
and the rich to take risks that weren’t reasonable.
A positive attitude in the face of adversity is an admirable
quality, and makes a person much more pleasant to be around
than constant negativity. But it can also distract ­people from
pursuing changes necessary to improve their circumstances.
Complaining can seem obnoxious and pointless, but it can also
sometimes be perfectly justified and the necessary first step
toward real change—­not just change within oneself, but change
in the world.
Still, I can understand why many Americans continue to
choose even unwarranted optimism over warranted complaints.
When you feel that your life might fall apart any minute, even
a hint of negativity can seem like the last straw. At times in
America, optimism was the only kind of thinking I could allow
myself, even if it verged on delusion. And I learned that in the
absence of the kind of true security that comes from things
like being able to pay your bills, having affordable health care,
knowing your children will get a good education no matter
what, or being able to take time to rest, all you can do is either
give in to depression or try to build your own personal well-­
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being bubble—­with yoga, meditation, diets, and keeping your
thoughts in check. That—­or eating fast food and burying your
worries with the TV remote.
The harshness of American life helps explain the presence
in the United States of a dubious, even predatory, wing of the
self-­help industry, which profits by selling unlikely promises to
the unlucky. It’s telling that self-­help gurus hardly exist in the
Nordic countries. They’re not necessary. As in other areas of
life in Nordic societies, this is an area where the basic goal of
the Nordic theory of love—­to provide every individual with
independence—­results in freedom. And the sort of freedom
I’m talking about here is freedom from investing energy in false
hope. Wishful thinking can take a nation only so far. Ultimately
hope has to be generated by the actual presence of opportunity.
And if it’s really there, it doesn’t require constant psychological
energy and enthusiasm, or a constant stream of heroic tales of
survival against all the odds, to sustain.
As I pondered the question Americans often posed to me—­Why
aren’t Finns more optimistic, despite their supposedly great society?—­I began to turn it around into a different question, a
question that seemed to me the more relevant one: How have
Finns managed to build such a great society, despite all their
negativity? Perhaps the answer is that Finns have built a great
society because of their pessimism, not in spite of it. The volume
of outrage and complaints that pour out of Finns whenever they
perceive an injustice in their society can be annoying—­especially
when that injustice might be considered minor in other countries. Nevertheless, perhaps this capacity for negative response is
part of the secret of Finnish success. Finns are quick to demand
real changes that improve their external circumstances. Where
an American today might be inclined to turn inward, meditate,
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and nurture positive thinking, a Finn is going to go yell at the
politicians until something gets fixed. No one would recommend that we all go around focusing only on our problems and
challenges. But based on Gabriele Oettingen’s research, the best
way to achieve our goals is actually to combine positive thinking
with realism. In other words, find the middle ground between
Finns and Americans.
When I compare the lives of my Nordic acquaintances with
those of my American friends, factoring in the curveballs that
life throws ­people in any country, there is still no question: The
Nordic p­ eople I know are by far more relaxed and stress-­free.
That might not be the final definition of happiness, but it’s an
awfully good start.
FREEDOM
About a year after I had first talked with Lars Trägårdh on
Skype about the Swedish theory of love, I traveled to Stockholm
and had lunch with him in a popular café in Stockholm’s hip
Södermalm neighborhood. I asked what it felt like for him to
be back in Sweden after living in the United States for so many
years. After all, he had practically fled Sweden as a teenager in
the 1970s, never imagining he would return. At the time Swedish society had felt much too constricting for him, and he still
has a soft spot for the American idea of freedom.
“I particularly like the West,” Trägårdh had told me during
our initial Skype conversation. “There’s a libertarian in me who
likes that kind of freedom. And as much as I rationally in my
brain think that the Nordic social contract is extremely good for
the vast majority of ­people, there’s also a very strong American
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libertarian in me who would prefer not to have any constraints.”
Now, over the café’s daily special of meat sauce, mashed potatoes, and lingonberries, Trägårdh admitted that there were
many things that he continued to miss about the United States.
He loved the sociability of Americans and the way they constantly expand their social networks, while Swedes tend to stick
with their old group of friends, holiday after holiday. But he
has also found Sweden much changed, and for the better. It’s a
more open society, with more interesting urban life and more
diversity than when he left as a youngster. And, he pointed out,
the United States has changed too. When he first arrived in
America, the country was just coming out of the 1960s and the
“summer of love.” Since then he has been troubled by changes
in the American mind-­set.
“One reason that I’m glad to be here in Sweden is that if I
look at my friends in New York who have kids that are my children’s age, there’s just so much pressure early on with the testing. Here it is important to teach children to be independent, to
play, to be children. That doesn’t figure in New York. The idea
of testing four-­year-­olds, there’s something sick about that.”
Trägårdh himself had found opportunities in the United
States, including financial aid for his college studies, but his
children would face a different America. And as Sweden has
become more hospitable to him, the United States has become
the opposite.
“Having a situation like we have in Sweden where you can
be relaxed, things work well, it’s not wrought with class issues,
you’re not paying lots of money and isolating yourself with your
little group, and you don’t have to insert your children into this
highly competitive system so early—­once you have children,
those things do matter. And there is a financial side to it as well.
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My friends who are academics in New York City are complaining about it. Even academics with fairly cushy salaries. They
pay so much of their money for these things, and then they have
to start saving for college too. So there is sort of a way in which
you become really imprisoned.”
As we ate and looked at various social research books and
studies, he showed me a graph of results from the World Values
Survey, a global research project measuring ­people’s beliefs in
different countries. Studying the data, Trägårdh has noticed
two things. One is that Sweden lies at the highest end of the
spectrum when it comes to valuing individual self-­realization
and personal autonomy, compared to other countries. Indeed,
I could see that the dot representing Sweden on the graph was
floating alone at the upper right-­hand corner of the grid. The
other Nordic countries hovered close by. This may come as a
surprise to Americans, but the United States hung significantly
lower on the graph, indicating that values were more old-­
fashioned and communitarian.
Seeing that Sweden was something of an outlier on this
graph, one could reasonably ask whether Sweden was really a
good example for any other country to follow—­maybe Sweden
was just unique, living in its own reality. Trägårdh had an
answer to that. “These studies have been done since the 1980s,
and if this was a movie instead of a photograph,” he said, gesturing above the graph, “the whole world would be moving this
way.” He moved his hand toward the dot representing Sweden.
The Nordic countries are not just strange and different. They’re
leading the way. All other advanced nations in the twenty-­first
century are moving in a similar direction when it comes to these
core social values. And according to Trägårdh, that’s because
­people everywhere in the world prefer more freedom rather
than less. The American system of today, however, is one of
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the laggards, and has yet to embrace the trend, or make significant progress in the direction the rest of the advanced world is
moving—­toward more freedom.
“Social systems that do not promote or enable the pursuit of
individual liberty are always going to be at a disadvantage. This
used to be the great strength of the United States, social mobility
and the American dream,” Trägårdh said. “But social mobility
without social investments is simply not possible. So if you start
to give up on public schools and a collective system for enabling
individual social mobility, you’re going to end up with inequality, gated communities, collapse of trust, a dysfunctional political system. All these things you see now in the United States.”
One summer Trevor and I traveled to Wyoming, and I knew
exactly what I wanted to do there. I wanted to go to a rodeo,
my first. We parked in a gravel lot and climbed to our seats
in the metal bleachers, the aroma of horses and earth wafting
around us in the late-­afternoon sun. The event kicked off with
the rodeo princess galloping through the ring, muscling a huge
American flag around the arena from her horse. Then a girl
sang the national anthem, while the rugged rodeo riders stood
along the fences with their cowboy hats held over their hearts.
At the end of the anthem, the announcer reminded the audience
to be grateful for the freedoms that are afforded to everyone in
this great country.
After the rodeo, as Trevor drove us slowly back to our lodgings along a pitch-­black road populated with deer wandering
the woods and open plains, I thought back to what the rodeo
announcer had said after the national anthem: how grateful
Americans should be for their freedoms. It’s an entirely worthy
sentiment that Americans love to express, and they do so often.
Many immigrants come to America from countries that don’t
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ensure basic freedoms the way the United States does, such as
freedom of speech. At the same time it’s almost as if Americans don’t realize that there are many, many other nations in
the world where citizens enjoy exactly the same freedoms that
Americans do, and where not as much fuss is made about them.
Moreover, Americans don’t seem to realize that there are citizens in other parts of the world, like the Nordic region, who
have acquired other kinds of freedoms that Americans lack. I
gazed through the car window into the vast Wyoming night,
the thrill of the rodeo and the wide-­open Wild West landscape
fresh in my mind, and asked myself: When are you truly free?
Are you free when you’re a rugged cowboy, alone on the
prairie, with no one asking anything of you, and no one giving
anything to you? Or is it when you are a homesteader, off the
grid, growing your own food, and relying on your family and
neighbors when you need help? Or is it when you know that
you can become whatever you want and make your own choices
regardless of your parents’ wealth or abilities, and when you can
rest assured that should you or your family falter, your society
will be there to keep you on your feet?
It is tempting to go with the first two scenarios, and why
not? ­People in those situations are in many ways free. But then
I thought back to a moment in the rodeo, when the action had
stopped and the announcer had invited all the kids from the
audience out into the ring, celebrated their attendance, and let
them run around like little cowboys, chasing a trio of sheep.
America loves its freedom, and it clearly loves its children. But it
does precious little to provide for either in concrete ways. When
those families left the rodeo, they were on their own.
Today nations that have progressed into the twenty-­first
century see freedom as something much richer. They see freedom as the assurance that all individuals get real opportunity,
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so they’re free to pursue the good life for themselves, and real
protection from the lottery of bad luck, so they’re free from unnecessary fear and anxiety. And a lot of Americans today are
desperate to have those freedoms.
On one visit to Finland I ended up in a bar with a group
of old friends. One of them, a well-­traveled man and father of
two, demanded that I answer this question: “The Nordic model
has done phenomenally well. That’s a given,” he started emphatically. “But what you have to tell us here in Finland is why
the United States is so overwhelmingly superior to all other countries in the world. In business, in the military, in the arts. It is.
But why? And why doesn’t that show in ordinary Americans’
lives?”
The first part of the question I could begin to answer. The
United States is a big country with abundant natural resources.
It has been able to build its society for more than a hundred
years without having had any devastating wars fought on its soil
and originally by benefiting from the extermination of the original native landholders and then from slave labor. It has been
a magnet to ­people from all over the world, and it has excelled
in encouraging ­people to work and create. Apart from the institution of slavery and ongoing problems with racism—­which
is a big caveat—­the United States has been a world leader in
democracy, opportunity, and freedom. When Alexis de Tocqueville arrived in America from France in the early 1800s, he
was astonished by the progress and achievements he found in
this young country. At the time Europe was still a continent
of kings, czars, and landed gentry, and de Tocqueville saw the
United States as an example of what the rest of the world would
eventually become: a democracy, and a place where all p­ eople
are free, equal, and earning their keep through their own work.
For a long time the United States led the world in educating
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its ­people and spreading its wealth to a majority of them. For a
long time America’s superiority did manifest itself in ordinary
­people’s lives: Americans were the freest and wealthiest of all.
My friend’s second question was harder to answer. Why
doesn’t American superiority show in ordinary ­people’s lives
anymore? All advanced nations are dealing with the same
twenty-­first-­century problems, brought on by globalization and
technology, and yet the middle class in those nations has caught
up with and in many ways surpassed the American middle class
in quality of life.
What I could offer my friend was this: At some point Americans forgot that it’s not enough to talk about equal opportunity,
democracy, and freedom. These things need to be protected and
supported by concrete actions—­something that Americans of
recent decades have neglected to do. The implications of this
are profound. In more cases than not, the guilt and frustration
that Americans feel about their difficulties in life, and their
anxieties, almost certainly do not arise from any personal failings. The United States today puts ­people, even ­people who
are doing well, into an intensely stressful logistical nightmare
that is exhausting. Why do Americans have to put themselves
through this, when there are other ways of life, proved and in
place, already functioning well for the combined population of
the twenty-­six million p­ eople of the Nordic region?
When I look at my Nordic friends now, they seem so free
to me. They work and have children, they engage in hobbies,
they travel the world, and they never seem to worry about really
going broke. They have health care, day care, and pensions.
They can study whatever they want, and they don’t have to risk
their financial future to do so.
The Nordic countries have their own fiscal conservatives
and libertarians who would like to see Nordic public ser­vices
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scaled down and handed over to the private sector instead.
Some of them look to the United States as a shining example of
the direction in which Nordic countries should proceed. When
I hear such views, I worry. True, there is much Nordics could
learn from the United States about innovation, entrepreneurship, personal responsibility, positive thinking, acceptance of
diversity, and above all, the irrepressible drive to excel in whatever task is at hand. At the same time the Nordic countries have
managed to create free societies that also provide security while
at once supporting exceptional levels of autonomy and strengthening families. They are by no means perfect, and they have
their own problems, but they have managed to give p­ eople the
independence necessary to shape their own lives, and to love
their family and friends without economic encumbrance and
without debilitating anxiety. All these achievements should not
be overlooked, and nor should they be dismissed as products
of unique Nordic circumstance and culture. Make no mistake:
These achievements may have been inspired by the Nordic
theory of love, but they are not achievements of culture, they
are achievements of policy. And any country can institute smart
policies, especially America.
The longer I lived in the United States the more I began to
love many aspects of my new life. There were the ­people—­my
American family and friends. There was the diversity—­the
multitude of ideas, religions, and cultures, the whole world
inside one country’s borders. There was the natural beauty I’d
seen—­the forests of Maine, the deserts and canyons of Utah and
Arizona, the beaches of California, and the craggy mountains and
sweet-­smelling fields of Wyoming on a summer evening. There
were the warm American values of loving your family, helping
your neighbor, and showing kindness and generosity even to
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strangers. And there was the accumulation of talent drawn to
this one country from all over the world, which has produced
astonishing levels of excellence in every field of human endeavor
imaginable. After coming to America I felt as if I was now truly
part of the world, and I found the feeling exhilarating, as if I
had been sitting in a small, quiet cabin and suddenly all the windows had been opened to reveal a carnival outside. I loved being
inside the nice cabin, but I also wanted to become one more participant in the carnival outdoors.
When I pondered the good and bad of my life in the United
States, on the bad side of the scale was the heavy burden of anxiety I felt on an almost daily basis about the prospect of starting a
family, or simply surviving in the harsh conditions that America
today imposes on its middle class. Much of my energy was spent
worrying whether I would ever make enough money to achieve
the kind of quality of life that I’d been able to attain in Finland,
with a basic sense of security, fewer administrative hassles, and
more time to spend with my loved ones. On the good side of the
scale were all the things I loved about America. And the question that preoccupied me the most was this: Does it really have
to be a choice between these two?
Individualism is one of the great foundations of Western culture. But unless society secures personal independence and basic
security for the individual, it can lead to disaffection, anxiety,
and chaos. For a long time now the United States has been turning toward its Wild West past, while the Nordic nations have
been taking individualism in the logical direction of further
progress, and into the future. While some of the praise heaped
on the Nordic nations in the international media and various
studies has surely been exaggerated and overpositive—­no place
is flawless, as Nordic ­people themselves will be the first to point
out—­the Nordic countries have undeniably created a model for
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what a high quality of life and a healthy society can look like
in the twenty-­first century. Bill Clinton’s question to Finland’s
president Tarja Halonen about what advice she would give to
other countries was a good one. The Nordic nations have set an
example from which America could profitably borrow, and in
the process, possibly return itself to its former glory as the best
country in the world. If that were to happen, I, for one, might
want to stay forever.
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EPILOGUE
O
n Wednesday, November 6, 2013, I entered the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, in downtown Brooklyn, with my American husband, Trevor, and my
Finnish friend Alli in tow. I made my way into a wood-­paneled
room lined with portraits of serious men, and sat down on a long
wooden bench. On my left side sat an elderly Korean man, and
on my right a young Chinese man. Other seats were taken by a
group of women from the Caribbean, Asian men and women of
all ages, and an elderly blonde woman speaking in Russian with
a younger, bald man wearing earrings and a dark green tuxedo
jacket. An old woman in a headscarf leaned on a walker and
dozed off in the front row, and a mother in a hijab entertained
her young child in a stroller with colored pens and paper.
Eventually we were called one by one to the table at the
center of the room to proffer our paperwork and sign our certificates, and then we waited again. I read a book I had brought
with me—­To Kill a Mockingbird—­and chatted with the man
sitting to my left. He’d come to America from Korea in the
1970s, served four years in the American army, and ran his own
business, not far from where I now lived, until he retired. The
man on my right didn’t seem to speak much English, and when
the voter registration forms were passed around, he filled out
the Chinese-­language version.
Finally our family and friends were allowed into the room
and the judge came in. Everyone stood up, and the judge led
us in reciting the oath of allegiance for new citizens, and then
the Pledge of Allegiance. She told us that she herself, as well
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as several of her colleagues in that very courthouse, had come
to America as children without knowing English, and yet had
risen to become federal judges. She also acknowledged the mistrust we might now feel toward the American government—­a
reference to the recent revelations of the government’s electronic
surveillance programs—­but assured us that the United States is
still a country of opportunity. After she finished, we were called
one by one to receive our certificates. With that I became an
American citizen.
As I walked out through the courthouse doors into the cool
fall day with Trevor and Alli, I felt intoxicated. How did I get
here? How did I, a girl from a small suburb in Finland, end up
a citizen of the United States of America? I thought of all the
millions of ­people around the world who needed this citizenship far more than I did, and of the hundreds of thousands of
undocumented immigrants living in the United States, many
of whom were brought to this country as children but still have
trouble getting citizenship. But isn’t this the essential American
experience of today, I thought—­squinting my eyes at the sun—­
this combination of pride in America’s greatness and dismay at
its brutal inequalities, all at the same time?
I also thought about how, as I’d prepared to become an
American citizen, I’d read up on American history, and studied
the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. I realized what a privilege it was to become a member of this society. I
could make an active choice to sign up for the basic ideals of the
United States, for the fundamentals of freedom and justice, and
that was all that was asked of me. No one asked me to change
my religion, dress, diet, or customs. Nobody inquired whether
I eat turkey at Thanksgiving or love American football. They
did require me to speak English, but the test was rudimentary.
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E P I LO G U E
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333
For all practical purposes I can be who I am, and as long as I
accept the American idea of everyone’s right to be who they are,
I’m accepted. Not many countries in the world can say that for
themselves.
As we stopped outside the courthouse doors to take a photo
and get our bearings—­where in the neighborhood could we
get some apple pie?—­a man with thick-­rimmed glasses and
a gray winter coat came out of the courthouse with his newly
Americanized wife. He kept hugging her excitedly, while she
smiled demurely, grasping her certificate in her hand just as I
was grasping mine. Trevor offered to take a photo of them with
their camera, and as they prepared to leave, the man glanced
back at me.
“Enjoy America,” he said, grinning. “I hope you like it.”
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
W
hen I moved to the United States at the end of 2008, I
knew only a handful of ­people in this vast nation. I had
worked all my life in Finland, and I had never attempted to
write a book, let alone one in English. While it’s become a cliché
to say that one has “depended on the kindness of strangers”—­a
strategy that didn’t work too well for Blanche DuBois, who
first uttered the famous line in Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar
Named Desire—­in my case, that’s exactly what I’ve done. Numerous p­ eople in the United States have given me their friendship, support, and advice, and placed their faith in my abilities
when they had little evidence that I actually possessed any. They
all have my eternal gratitude.
My profound thanks go to my editor, Gail Winston, and
everyone at Harper­Collins, my agent, Kim Witherspoon, and
everyone at Inkwell Management, Stephanie Mehta and everyone who worked at Fortune during my brief fellowship there,
Sewell Chan of the New York Times, Jennie Rothenberg Gritz
of the Atlantic, and Hugh Van Dusen and Wendy Wolf. They
all took a chance on me and helped me start a writing career in
the United States. Gail, in particular, never seemed discouraged
when faced with the unwieldy first drafts of this book. Instead
she proceeded to do what a great editor does: save the writer
from herself.
I’m grateful to the KONE Foundation, the Alfred Kordelin
Foundation, and the Finnish Association of Non-­Fiction Writers
for their support, and to the Helsingin Sanomat Foundation for
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funding the fellowship that allowed me to come to the United
States in the first place.
I interviewed more than a hundred p­ eople for this book.
Most of them are not named, but I thank them all. I am
especially indebted to those who shared their personal experiences with me and introduced me to other ­people to interview.
Special thanks to Jennifer Bensko Ha, Maria-­Eugenia Dalton,
Mads Egeskov Sørensen, Sigrid Egeskov Andersen, Brandur
Ellingsgaard, Hannah Villadsen Ellingsgaard, Pamela Harrell-­
Savukoski, Kaarina Hazard, Ville Heiskanen, Nina Jähi, Tracy
Høeg, Hanna and Olli Lehtonen, Mika Oksa, Kerstin Sjödén,
and Fredrik Wass. Thank you, kiitos, tack, tak.
Several experts were exceptionally generous with their time
and insights, including Lars Trägårdh, Pasi Sahlberg, Tine Rostgaard, Markus Jäntti, Laura Hartman, Leena Krokfors, Juhana
Vartiainen, Sixten Korkman, Bengt Holmström, Heikki Hiilamo, Pauli Kettunen, Jaana Leipälä, Juha Hernesniemi, Sakari
Orava, and Risto E. J. Penttilä. (They don’t all agree with one
another, and naturally the conclusions I’ve drawn and any
mistakes are my own.) I’d also like to thank the employees of
the multiple Finnish government agencies who answered my
endless questions patiently and promptly. I must say, I love the
Finnish bureaucrat!
Friends and colleagues encouraged me along the way, sent
me articles and books to read, suggested ­people to interview,
shared their own experiences with me, and generally kept me
sane through the struggle and frustration of trying to think
clearly and write well. I cannot thank enough Tulikukka de
Fresnes, Anna-­Liina Kauhanen, Taina and David Droeske,
Mari Saarenpää, Veera Sylvius, Mari Teittinen, Noora Vainio,
Alli Haapasalo, Chris Giordano, Laura and Saska Saarikoski,
Spencer Boyer, Clare Stroud, Jessica DuLong, and Ben Rubin.
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3 37
My family on both sides of the Atlantic never wavered in
their love and support, even when it must have seemed to them
that this book would never be done. Kirsti, Erkki, and Esa
Partanen, Mikko and Veera Korvenkari, Sarah Corson, Dick
Atlee, Ash Corson, Ann Corson, Jon Jaeger, Holly Lord, John
Coyle, and everyone in the Lord family. Thank you for everything.
Finally there’s Trevor Corson, who never tired of talking
over ideas with me, or reading many, many—­too many—­drafts
of this book before I ever dared show them to anyone else. To
have your best friend and life partner be such a generous and
encouraging person as well as such a fantastic colleague—­all
writers should be so lucky.
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NOTES
All references below indicate items that are listed in the bibliography,
unless otherwise noted. For bibliography items, the primary author’s
last name is given, plus page numbers for the longer documents; if the
item has no author listed, or the same author has multiple entries in
the bibliography, or several authors share the same last name, the first
word or two of the item’s title is given as well.
PROLOGUE
1
3
3
4
4
4
4
4
5
5
5
5
Description of panel discussion with President Clinton is based on
an online video: Clinton Global Initiative.
Finnish high-­school students: OECD, Lessons, 116; Ministry of Education and Culture, Finland and PISA.
Newsweek: Foroohar, 30–32.
Monocle: Morris, 18–22.
World Economic Forum: Schwab Global Competitiveness Report
2011–2012; Global Competitiveness Report 2012–2013.
Work-­life balance: Ranking is based on the OECD’s online tool,
Better Life Index. Results for work-­life balance in 2011–2012 were
reported by Bradford; Thompson.
Innovation: European Commission, 7.
Happiness: Helliwell, 30.
Financial Times: Milne.
Failed states: Fund for Peace.
Ed Miliband comments: Miliband.
“Scandinavian” vs. “Nordic”: In the Nordic nations “Scandinavia” is usually understood to include only Denmark, Norway, and
Sweden due to their closely related North Germanic languages.
Icelandic is a subset of the same language family. Finnish, by con|
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trast, is a completely unrelated language of Uralic origin. These five
nations use the term “Nordic” to refer to themselves as a culturally
and politically unified region. To English-­speakers, however, the
term “Nordic” can evoke racist ideas popular in Nazi Germany,
and thus in the United States “Scandinavia” is commonly used to
refer to all five Nordic countries.
David Cameron and the Nordic nations: Bagehot.
The Economist’s special report: Wooldridge.
Vanity Fair on Scandinavia: Hotchner.
ONE: IN THE LAND OF THE FREE
12
13
17
20
20
Poisoned cookies: Greenhouse.
Helen Mirren: Hattenstone.
Sick days and parental leaves in Finland: Citizens have a universal
right to about one year of paid sick leave and ten months of paid
parental leave. Pay during a leave is subsidized by the government
and covers part of the leave taker’s salary (for parental leave, about
70 percent). Some employers offer better benefits, usually due to
collective agreements. Employers can fire a sick employee only if an
illness has prevented the employee from performing his or her tasks
for an extended period of time, usually a year. See Kela, Health,
8–10; Kela, Maternity, 2–8; Virta.
Credit cards: Credit card interest rates and fees are notoriously difficult to compare, but one survey in 2011 put the average American
annual percentage rate at 15 percent, with rates ranging from about
11 to 25 percent, while another survey put the Finnish range from
about 7.5 to 14.5 percent. I myself had never received one single
credit card offer in the mail in Finland. See Tomasino; Ranta.
Cell phones: Since my arrival in the United States, American cell
phone carriers have started to sell phones and plans separately, and
Finnish carriers have started to offer package deals. However, a
2014 report found that mobile data in Finland were still among the
cheapest in the world, while American data were among the most
expensive. Finns paid $5.18 for 500 MB of mobile data while Amer-
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22
22
22
22
22
23
24
24
25
26
27
30
31
32
33
34
37
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3 41
icans paid $76.21. See International Telecommunication Union,
132.
Anxiety-­inducing articles about superachievers and the unfortunate: Baker; Holmes; Lublin; Seligson; Abelson; Jubera; Mascia.
Food-­borne illness: Moss.
Toxic plastic bottles: Grady.
Toxic toys: Lipton.
Antibiotics and cattle: Kristof, “The Spread.”
Countries by GDP per capita: OECD, National, 25.
Anxiety disorders and sales of prescription drugs: National Institute of Mental Health; IMS Health; Smith.
Women’s financial insecurity: When the study was repeated in 2013,
the results were very similar, with 27 percent of women with household income of more than two hundred thousand dollars fearing
“becoming a bag lady.” See Coombes; Allianz.
Uninsured in the United States: According to the U.S. Census
Bureau, 16.7 percent of Americans, or 50.7 million ­people, lacked
health insurance in 2009. See DeNavas-­Walt, 22.
Newsweek on the best country in the world: Foroohar, 30–32.
David Beckham’s operation: Beckham was operated on in Turku,
Finland, by a Finnish sports-­injury specialist named Sakari Orava.
See Young.
Parents doing children’s homework: The prestigious Sidwell
Friends School in Washington, DC, went so far as to write a letter
to parents urging them to let students do their own English homework without editing by parents or tutors. See Sidwell.
Parents texting with college-­age offspring, influencing their college
opportunities, and being their best friends: Volk Miller; DeParle,
“For Poor”; Williams.
“Helicopter parenting”: Gottlieb, “How”; Gunn; Kolbert.
Sales of antianxiety and antidepression drugs: McDevitt.
Finnish children named Ridge and Brooke: Population Register
Centre.
Career women on finding a spouse: Bolick; Gottlieb, “Marry”;
Rosin.
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37
38
39
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Marriage among high-­school educated whites: Murray.
Debate over marriage: Chait; Cherlin; DeParle, “For Women”;
Frum; Samarrai; Schuessler.
Twenty-­thousand dollars for giving birth: Wildman.
Law on American parental leaves: U.S. Department of Labor.
TWO: THE NORDIC THEORY OF LOVE
47
49
51
54
55
57
57
58
60
Pippi Longstocking in translation: Astridlindgren.se.
Är svensken människa?: Berggren, Är; Neander-­Nilsson.
Trägårdh and Berggren’s discussion on Pippi Longstocking: Berggren, “Pippi,” 12.
Finland’s war losses 1939–1944: Some 700,000 Finns, from a population of 3.7 million, fought in the wars, and 93,000 died. See Leskinen, 1152–55.
“The number of Finns who sacrificed their lives”: American deaths
in the Korean and Vietnam Wars amount to 95,000, almost the
same as Finland’s losses (93,000) in the two wars against the Soviet
Union. The Finnish population was 5.5 million in July 2015, while
America’s was 320 million. Leskinen, 1152–53; Leland, 3.
Child well-­being in different countries: UNICEF.
World’s best countries for mothers: Save, 10.
Trägårdh and Berggren on family as a social institution: Berggren,
“Social,” 15.
“We’re living in the middle of an amazing era”: Brooks.
THREE: FAMILY VALUES FOR REAL
64
65
65
65
Average annual cost of child care for an infant in the state of New
York was $10,400, and in New York City $16,250 in 2009. See Office
of Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Child Care.
Costs of giving birth: Truven; Rosenthal, “American Way.”
Law on American parental leaves: U.S. Department of Labor.
Workers covered by the law granting right to parental leave: Klerman.
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66
66
66
66
66
66
67
67
70
71
72
72
72
73
73
74
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343
Pregnant women losing their jobs and lack of job security in the
United States: Bakst; Graff; Liptak; Redden; Suddath; Swarns;
New York State Office of the Attorney General.
Parental leaves around the world: Addati, 16.
Sick leave in different countries: Heymann; World Policy Forum.
Cities and states offering paid sick leave in the United States: White
House Office, “White House Unveils.”
California’s paid family leave program: Employment Development.
Examples of corporate family leave policies: Grant.
Americans’ access to paid leave: Bureau of Labor Statistics, “Table
32” and “Table 38.”
Length of maternity leave taken in the United States: U.S. Department of Health, 40.
Cost of Hanna’s hospital stay: In 2015 the maximum charge for a
day in a basic room at a public hospital in Finland was €38.10. The
hospital Hanna stayed in charged double for a private family room.
She paid for four days at a rate of €76.20 and for one day at a rate of
€38.10, bringing her total bill to €342.90, which in July 2015 equaled
about $375. The price included room and board, doctors’ fees, all
operations, and drugs provided in-­house. Ministry of Social Affairs
and Health, Terveydenhuollon; HUS.
Average length of stay for normal delivery in different countries:
OECD, Health at a Glance 2015, 109.
Nordic maternity benefits as a percentage of salary: Nordic Social, 42.
Parental leave in Norway: Norwegian Labour.
Administration of parental leave benefits in Nordic countries: Aula,
33–34, 42–44.
Breast-­feeding in Finland: Uusitalo.
The length of parental leaves and other information on Finnish
family benefits can be found on the Web site of Kela, the Social Security Institution of Finland. In order to qualify for paternity leave,
a father must reside in the home with the mother and the child. See
Kela, Benefits for Families.
Access to day care for Nordic parents: After the birth of a child,
the right to public day care in Nordic countries typically starts later
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74
75
75
76
76
76
76
76
76
78
81
81
82
84
84
85
86
86
86
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than many American parents would expect it to, not until a child
is between six months and one year old, depending on the country.
From an American perspective, one could argue that the lack of
public day care options for younger infants limits parents’ ability
to return to work sooner, should they want to. However, in Nordic
countries most parents are happy to take full advantage of the long
parental leaves that are guaranteed to everyone, thus this has not
become an issue. Nordic Social, 57–63.
Finnish children in day care by age and type of institution: Säkkinen.
Public day-­care fees in Finland: Ministry of Education Varhaiskasvatuksen.
Swedish parental leave: Försäkringskassan.
Swedish day-­care fees: Nordic Social, 73.
Nordic children enrolled in day care by age: Nordic Social, 62.
Part-­time parental leave in Nordic countries: Duvander, 43.
Caring at home for a sick child: Nordic Social, 52–53.
Vacation time in Finland: Ministry of Employment and Economy.
Paid vacation in other Nordic countries: European Foundation,
17–19; Fjölmenningarsetur.
Finland’s baby box: Tierney; Kela, Maternity.
“Why, in the world’s most affluent”: Newman, Kindle loc. 207.
“Citizens of Norway, Denmark, Finland”: Newman, 39–40.
Nordic unemployment benefits and policies: Nordic Social, 79–102;
Kela, Unemployment.
Marco Rubio’s speech: Quotes are from a transcript published on
Senator Rubio’s Web site. See Rubio.
Job training for the unemployed in Finland: Kela, Unemployment.
Married, cohabiting, and single parents in different countries:
OECD, Doing Better for Families, 28.
Studies on problems experienced by children in single-­parent families: Amato; Berger, 160–161; U.S. Department of Health, 12; DeParle, “For Women”; Murray.
Claim that government programs destroy families: for example, see
Edsall; Levin; Rubio.
Cross-­national comparison of single parenthood: Casey.
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86
87
88
89
90
91
92
92
92
94
94
95
96
97
97
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345
Family structure in different countries: Livingston; OECD, Doing
Better, 25–28; OECD, Family Database; Statistics Finland.
“The patterns of family formation”: Newman, 159.
Parental leave benefits for someone without work history, in Finland and other Nordic countries: Nordic Social, 40–42; Kela, Allowance and Amount.
Single parents in employment: OECD, Doing Better, 216, 225, 238.
Jennifer M. Silva on young working-­class Americans and marriage:
Silva.
Share of female parliamentarians and cabinet members in different
countries: OECD, Women, 28–29.
Time spent on child care and housework by gender: Bureau of Labor
Statistics, “Table 1” and “Table 9”; Miranda, 11–12; Parker, Modern.
Finnish children in day care: Säkkinen.
Breast-­feeding guidelines and reality in Finland: To be exact, WHO
recommends breast-­feeding, with complementary foods, up to the
age of two or beyond, and Finland recommends it up to the age
of one or beyond. Aula, 49; World Health Organization; National
Institute of Health, Tietopaketit; Uusitalo.
Daddy quotas in Nordic countries: Denmark introduced a
father’s quota in 1997 but abolished it in 2002. Other Nordic countries continue to have them. The information on Nordic parental
leaves is current as of July 2015. See Duvander, 38–39; Nordic Social,
41–49; Rostgaard, 8–9; OECD, Closing, 208; Poulsen; Försäkringskassan; Kela, Paternity; Norwegian.
Daddy quotas’ impact on housework, child care, and paid work:
Addati, 52; Nordic Social 49; OECD, Closing, 208–9; Patnaik; National Institute of Health, Tilastotietoa.
American men’s attitudes and challenges related to paternity leave:
Berdahl; Cain Miller, “Paternity Leave”; Harrington; Ludden;
Mundy.
Marissa Mayer’s pregnancy: Sellers; Swisher.
Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In: Sandberg, chaps. 7 and 9.
Nordic and American women as managers: Blau; OECD, Closing
156, 177.
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98
98
99
99
100
100
101
102
102
103
103
104
104
105
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American stay-­at-­home moms: Cohn.
Nordic and American women in the labor force: In 1990 the United
States had the sixth-­highest female labor participation rate among
twenty-­two OECD countries. By 2010 its rank had fallen to seventeenth. See Blau; OECD Closing, 156, 177, 235.
American families with two working parents: Parker.
Cost of day care in the U.S.: Child Care Aware.
Nordic children in day care: Nordic Social, 62.
Ideal length of maternity leave for women’s careers: Addati, 8–9;
OECD, Closing, 209; World Economic Forum, Global Gender
(2015), 43; OECD, Babies, 21; Cain Miller, “Can.”
Gender gap in different countries: World Economic Forum, Global
Gender (2013) 20; World Economic Forum, Global Gender (2015), 4, 8.
White House Report on family policies and economic growth: Executive Office of the President, 43.
Family and medical leave laws in American states: National Conference, State Family.
Consequences of California’s paid parental leave: Appelbaum; Economic Report of the President, 130.
The Family Act: Office of Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, American.
President Obama’s leave proposals: Economic Report of the President,
130; White House Office, “White House Unveils.”
ILO’s recommendations and development of parental leaves:
Addati, 9, 11, 16, 20, 22, 25–27.
International organizations’ support for paid leaves and affordable
child care: European Commission; OECD, Closing, 18–19; World
Economic Forum, Global Gender (2015), 36–43.
FOUR: HOW CHILDREN ACHIEVE
110 Charter school performance: Center for Research on Education
Outcomes.
111 Children of the rich outperform other children: Reardon.
112 Finland and the United States in PISA: Kupari; Ministry of Education, Finland and PISA; Ministry of Education, PISA12; OECD,
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114
116
117
118
118
120
121
121
121
121
121
122
123
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Country; OECD, Lessons; OECD, PISA 2009 Results; OECD, PISA
2012 Results: What Students Know; Sahlberg, “Why.”
History of Finland’s education system: OECD, Lessons, 118–123;
Sahlberg, Finnish, chap. 1.
“Some predicted a gloomy future”: Sahlberg, Finnish, 19.
Sahlberg’s visit at the Dwight School: In-­person observations by the
author; some of the material here has been published previously in
the Atlantic. See Partanen.
Independent schools and private universities in Finland: The one
exception is the International School of Helsinki, which has permission from the Ministry of Education to charge annual tuition of
almost ten thousand dollars because it follows an international curriculum and serves mainly children of foreign families living in the
country temporarily. E-­mail interview with Anne-­Marie Brisson of
the Ministry of Education and Culture (Aug. 4, 2015); e-­mail interview with Laura Hansén of the Ministry of Education and Culture
(Aug. 10, 2015); Ministry of Education and Culture, Basic, Funding, and Valtioneuvosto; Basic Education Act 628/1998, chap. 3 and
chap. 7, section 31; Yle.
Right to free education in Finland: Ministry of Justice, section 17.
Poor economics and supply vs. demand approach to education: Banerjee, chap. 4.
American students in private schools, expansion of for-­
profit
schools, and private testing ser­vices: Chingos, 10; Miron; Kena, 74.
Private schools in Sweden: OECD, Equity, 71; OECD, Improving,
93–96.
Standardized testing in various countries: Morris.
India’s school vouchers: Muralidharan; Shah.
Obama’s and Romney’s views on education: Gabriel; Romney;
White House Office, “Remarks by the President on Education
Reform.”
“A civilized society cannot allow”: Banerjee, 78.
Parents’ wealth and education and American students’ school success:
OECD, Country; OECD, Lessons, 34; OECD, Economic Policy, 188;
OECD, PISA 2012 Results: Excellence Through Equity, 39; Reardon.
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124 Child poverty in different countries: UNICEF Innocenti; UNICEF
Office, 7.
125 Debate on poverty and school reform: See, for example, Klein;
Rhee; Thomas.
125 Risks related to child poverty: UNICEF Innocenti, 4.
125 Countries with more inequality but less variety in educational outcomes than the United States: OECD, Lessons, 34.
125 Income inequality in Finland: OECD, Society, 66–67.
128 Examples of influential studies on the benefits of early-­childhood
education: Campbell; Schweinhart.
128 Expanding early-childhood education in the United States: National Center for Education Statistics, “Table 5.1”; White House
Office, President Obama’s Plan; Harris.
128 Nordic children in day care: Ministry of Education and Culture,
Every Child; Nordic Social, 57–62; Säkkinen.
129 Finnish day-­care activities and goals: Skype interview with Eeva
Hujala of Tampere University (Jan. 31, 2013); author interviews
with parents; daily schedules posted online by Finnish day-­care centers.
131 Finnish day-­care regulations and quality: At the time of writing in
2015, the Finnish government was planning to allow a staff-­to-­child
ratio of one adult for eight children over the age of three. Ministry of Education and Culture, Early Childhood; Taguma; UNICEF
Office, 21.
131 Sam Kass on day care: Kass spoke at Parenting magazine’s 2012
Mom Congress in Washington, DC.
134 Teacher education in Finland: OECD, Lessons 125; Sahlberg, Finnish, chap. 3; interview with Leena Krokfors of Helsinki University
(Oct. 12, 2012).
134 Teacher education in the United States: Foderaro; Greenberg;
Levine; National Council on Teacher Quality; NYC Department;
Putnam; Smith.
135 Criticism of Teach for America: Naison; Ehrenfreund; Rich,
“Fewer”; Winerip.
135 Teachers’ salaries: OECD, Education, 454.
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135 High performers in PISA invest in teachers: OECD, Does Money.
136 Standardized tests in the United States: The 2001 “No Child Left
Behind” law signed by President George W. Bush made the tests a
requirement for receiving federal funds. In recent years a movement
opposing excessive testing has gained ground. In 2015 the Obama
administration acknowledged that its policies had helped push testing and teacher evaluations too far. Efforts to reform “No Child Left
Behind” were ongoing at the time of writing. For reform efforts, see
Rich, “ ‘No Child’ ”; Steinhauer; Strauss; Zernike, “Obama.”
137 Rating schools and teachers based on students’ test scores: Aviv;
Banchero; Harris; OECD, Country, 5; Otterman; Rizga; Santos,
“City Teacher Data” and “Teacher Quality.”
137 Autonomy of Finnish schools: Interviews with Pasi Sahlberg (Dec.
8, 2011, May 11, 2012, and Oct. 25, 2014); Sahlberg, “Quality,”
28; OECD, Lessons, 123–27; interview with principal Mika Oksa
(Mar. 7, 2012).
139 Finnish teachers unions: According to the Trade Union of Education in Finland, 95 percent of teachers in Finland are members,
even though unionization in Finland is completely voluntary. See
http://www.oaj.fi/cs/oaj/public_en.
139 Cost of standardized tests in the United States: Chingos.
139 Schools cheating on tests: The most infamous cheating scandal in
the United States so far happened in Atlanta, where eighty-­two educators in thirty schools confessed to inflating students’ test scores
in one school year. Eleven public school teachers were convicted
of crimes, and some were sentenced to several years in prison, for
repeatedly erasing and replacing students’ answers on tests. Widespread cheating has been reported in dozens of cities. See Aviv;
Fausset; Rich, “Scandal”; U.S. Government Accountability Office.
141 Subjects taught in Finnish schools: The Finnish National Core
Curriculum and minimum instruction hours for all subjects can be
found online at the Finnish National Board of Education Web site.
141 Arts education in American schools: Dillon; McMurrer; U.S. Department of Education, “Prepared Remarks of U.S. Secretary of
Education”; Parsad.
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141 Finland adding more lessons in arts and crafts: Ministry of Education and Culture, Työryhmä.
142 Dan Rather interviewing Linda Darling-­
Hammond: StanfordScope.
143 Tiistilä School: I attended the upper school from the fall of 1987 to
the spring of 1990. My reporting there for this book took place on
Sept. 10–11, 2013. I rely on my own observations as well as interviews with school staff and students, particularly the school principal, Mirja Pirinen, and the assistant principal, Marikka Korhonen.
143 Size of Finnish schools and classes: Ministry of Education and Culture, Opetusryhmien tila, 22, 25–26; OECD, Lessons, 124.
144 Finnish law stating that children need time for hobbies and rest:
Basic Education Act 628/1998, chap. 6, section 24.
144 Impact of private tutoring and other family spending on the American educational gap: Associated Press, “School Spending”; Duncan,
3–4; Greenstone, Dozen, 12, and Thirteen, chap. 2; Phillips.
145 Afternoon care for Finnish school children: In 2011, 98 percent of
Finnish municipalities offered afternoon care for students in first or
second grade. Ministry of Education and Culture, Perusopetuksen.
145 Time spent in school in different countries: OECD, Education, 428.
146 Ranking schools in Finland: The Finnish National Matriculation
Examination Board published results for individual academic high
schools on its Web site for the first time in 2015, but the schools were
listed in alphabetical order and the results were hard to understand
without further analysis. That job was left to the media. Overall,
Finnish education administrators and researchers have shown profound dislike for such rankings. See Kortelainen; Laitinen; Mäkinen; Takala; Ylioppilastutkintolautakunta.
146 Collaboration in Finnish schools: Author interviews with Finnish
teachers; Toivanen; Peltomäki; Schleicher, 19.
146 Problems related to team sports in American schools: Lavigne;
Ripley, “The Case”; Wolverton.
147 Exchange students’ observations in different countries: Ripley,
“The Smartest,” 71–72, 99–101, 196.
150 Parental involvement and student achievement: Robinson.
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351
150 Fredrick M. Hess on “Finlandophilia”: Jenny Anderson.
151 Diversity in Finland and the United States: Grieco; Statistics Finland, Foreigners.
152 Norwegian approach to education: Abrams; OECD, Education
Policy Outlook Norway.
152 Swedish approach to education: Hartman; OECD, Improving
Schools in Sweden.
154 School funding in Finland: Eurydice; STT.
155 “Local property wealth per capita in a given state’s richest school
district”: Carey, “School Funding’s,” 6.
155 School funding in the United States: Carey, “School Funding’s”;
Baker; Ushomirsky; U.S. Department of Education, “For Each and
Every Child,” 17–20.
155 “Imagine two towns”: U.S. Department of Education, “For Each
and Every Child,” 17.
156 Education spending in different countries: In 2011, Luxembourg,
Switzerland, Norway, Austria, and the United States spent the
most out of all OECD countries on primary and secondary education (usually ages six to fifteen) when measured as dollars per
student, including public and private spending. As a percentage of
GDP, the U.S. came in eighth in total education spending for all
levels of education (including universities), while Finland came in
eleventh. OECD, Country, 4; OECD, Education at a Glance 2014,
222; OECD, Education Spending; OECD, Lessons, 28, 130.
156 Dan Rather on education administration in Finland and Los Angeles: Dan.
157 Finns borrowing ideas from other countries: Interview with Leena
Krokfors of Helsinki University (Oct. 12, 2012); interviews with
Pasi Sahlberg (Dec. 8 , 2011, May 11, 2012, and Oct. 25, 2014); Sahlberg, Finnish, 34–35.
158 University rankings: Times.
158 “When President Obama has said”: Carey, “Americans Think.”
159 Adult literacy, numeracy, and technological skills in different countries: OECD, OECD Skills Outlook.
160 Higher education spending and costs for families in the United
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States: In 2015 the College Board estimated that undergraduate tuition, fees, room, and board at American public institutions costs
on average $19,548 for one academic year, and at private nonprofit
institutions $43,921 for one academic year—­bringing the total average published price for a private four-­year college education for
one student to $175,000. See College Board; Economic Report of the
President, 132–34, 137–38; Kirshstein; OECD, Education spending
(indicator).
160 University fees and stipends in Finland: Public financial support
for a student in higher education consists of a study grant, housing supplement, and government guarantee for student loans. In
the spring of 2016 the monthly study grant was €336.75 for all students over the age of eighteen not living with their parents. The
maximum monthly rent subsidy came to €201.60 for all students
not living with their parents nor renting accommodation owned by
their parents. Thus the maximum financial aid for living expenses
came to slightly less than six hundred dollars per month, at March
2016 exchange rates. In addition, rents in student housing and terms
for student loans are reasonable, and other subsidies for meals and
transportation may apply. See Student Union; Kela, Government
Guarantee; Kela, Housing Supplement, Kela, Study Grant.
161 American college admissions for those who can pay or are children
of alumni: Mandery; Zernike, “Paying.”
163 Finnish goal of meaningful education or employment for all youths
under the age of twenty-five: Ministry of Education and Culture,
Koulutustakuu.
FIVE: HEALTHY BODY, HEALTHY MIND
168 Life of uninsured Americans: Buckley; Kristof, “A Possibly Fatal.”
169 Americans dying for lack of health insurance: Doyle; FactCheck.
Org; IOM, Care and America’s; Krugman, “Death”; Sommers;
Weiner.
170 Hospitals charging the uninsured: Arnold, “When Nonprofit”;
Brill; Silver-­Greenberg; Rosenthal, “As Hospital.”
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353
170 Medical bankruptcy in the United States: Brill; Himmelstein; La
Montagne; Sack; Underwood.
171 Health-care systems in different countries: Reid.
173 Health insurance coverage in the United States in 2014: The percentages add up to more than 100 percent because p­ eople may be
covered by more than one type of health insurance during the year.
Smith.
174 Medicaid eligibility: Artiga.
178 Americans losing and gaining health insurance: Hayes; Rosenbaum: Sanger-­Katz.
178 Americans postponing retirement because of health insurance:
Fronstin.
178 Employment rates in different countries: OECD, OECD Factbook
2014, 133.
182 Cost of employer-­sponsored health insurance in the United States:
Claxton; Rosenthal, “The $2.7 Trillion.”
184 Out-­of-­pocket maximums and other health-care fees in Finland:
More information can be found on the Web sites of the Finnish
Ministry of Social Affairs and Health; and Kela, the Social Insurance Institution of Finland. Health-­care ser­vices for children under
the age of eighteen count toward their guardian’s out-­of-­pocket
maximum. After the out-­
of-­
pocket maximum for prescription
drugs is reached, the patient has to pay less than three dollars per
prescription. For coverage of drugs, see Finnish Medicines Agency.
184 Government subsidies for private health care in Finland: Blomgren;
Kela, Statistical Yearbook, 166–67, 169.
185 Access to specialists and elective surgery in different countries:
Davis 20; Gubb 8, 16–18; OECD, Health at a Glance 2015, 128–29.
187 Health outcomes, survival rates, access to care and comparisons of
health-care systems in different countries: Commonwealth Fund,
“Why Not the Best,” 24–25; Davis; OECD, Health at a Glance 2015,
46–45, 58–59, 81, 151, 153, 155.
188 “American medicine is the best in the world when it comes to”:
NPR.
189 Harvard study on medical bankruptcy: Himmelstein.
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190 Costs for patients after ObamaCare: Goodnough, “Unable”; Health
Care.gov; Rosenthal, “After Surgery,” “As Insurers,” and “Costs.”
190 Health-care spending in different countries: OECD Health at a
Glance 2015, 164–65.
191 Prices of procedures in different countries: International Federation.
191 “Americans pay, on average, about four times as much for a hip
replacement”: Rosenthal, “The 2.7 Trillion.”
192 Why American health care is so expensive: Bach; Brill; Fujisawa;
Gawande; International Federation; OECD, Health at a Glance
2015, 114–15, and Why; Rampell; Rosenthal, “In Need,” “The Soaring Cost,” and “Medicine’s”; Squires.
196 Sarah Palin on death panels: Drobnic Holan.
197 The price of a hip replacement in American hospitals: Rosenthal,
“Availability.”
198 American doctors spending time getting drugs and treatments covered: Davis, 23; Ofri.
200 Drug and treatment coverage in Finland: Finnish Medicines Agency;
e-­mail interview with Lauri Pelkonen of the Ministry of Social
­Affairs and Health (Aug. 21, 2015); interview with Jaana Leipälä of
the National Institute of Health and Welfare (Oct. 17, 2013).
201 How drug and treatment coverage works in the United States:
Bach; Brill; Jacobs; Lim; Rosenthal, “Insured,” Siddiqui.
202 Trust in doctors in different countries: Blendon.
202 Births relying on midwives vs. obstetricians: OECD, Health at a
Glance 2013, 68.
203 American doctors overusing MRI tests and antibiotics: OECD,
Health at a Glance 2013, 86–87, 110–11; Health at a Glance 2015,
102–3, 136–37.
205 Guy Thompto on freedom: The online commentator going by the
name Thompto left his comment (July 11, 2012) on a New York Times
opinion piece written by the Czech film director Milos Forman titled
“Obama the Socialist? Not Even Close” (July 10, 2012).
207 A patient’s right to choose in Nordic countries: Anell, 44, 61–62;
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208
209
209
213
214
214
214
214
215
217
219
220
222
226
227
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Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, Hoitopaikan valinta; Olejaz,
46–47, 73, 113–14; Ringard, 22, 42.
“Universal Laws of Health Care Systems”: Reid, 27.
Finns believe in national health-­care system: Taloudellinen tiedotustoimisto.
Maximum wait times for access to care and patient fees in Finland:
Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, Hoitoon pääsy and Terveydenhuollon maksut.
Price of multiple sclerosis drugs in the United States: Hartung.
Medicare and Medicaid nursing home and home health-­care coverage: Bernstein; Medicare.gov, Your Medicare and How Can I; Taha;
Thomas.
Median financial net worth of Americans aged 55–64: Sommer.
Median annual cost of a private nursing home in the United States:
Genworth.
Americans worried about financing retirement: Bank of America;
Morin.
Women quitting work to care for elderly family members: Searcey.
Elder care in Nordic countries: Help Age International; Nordic
Social, 155–162; Osborn International; interview with Tine Rostgaard from Aalborg University (Sept. 10, 2013).
Affordable Care Act’s impact by 2015: Blumenthal David; Krugman, “Rube”; Pear, “Number.”
Taxes and funding of American health care: Gruber; Horpedahl;
Rae.
Rising health-care costs for American workers: Commonwealth,
Why Are; IOM, America’s; Osborn, The Commonwealth; Schoen;
Swift.
Americans supporting government role in health care: Balz;
Gallup; Connelly; Pew Research Center, “Millennials,” 35–36; Pew
Research Center, “Political,” 68–69.
Efforts to create public health-­care options in the United States: Associated Press, “Governor”; McDonough; Office of Senator Jamie
Eldridge; Perkins; Varney; Wheaton.
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228 Drug companies’ profits, advertising, and R&D: Richard Anderson;
Brill; Rosenthal, “The Soaring Cost.”
228 Obama seeking to negotiate Medicare drug prices: Morgan; Pear,
“Obama.”
228 Legislation requiring drug companies to justify prices: Editorial
Board; Silverman.
228 Employers interested in not offering health insurance to employees:
Goldstein; Pear, “I.R.S.”
229 Ron Paul and debate audience members on whether an uninsured
man should die: RonPaul2008dotcom.
230 Story about self-­employed man who could have paid for insurance
but didn’t, then got cancer: Kristof, “A Possibly.”
230 Unpaid medical bills fall on the taxpayer: Brill; Goodnough, “Hospitals.”
231 Insurance companies raising prices: Pear, “Health Insurance”;
Schoen.
231 Americans’ vengeful attitude toward insurance companies: Andrews.
231 Millennials’ attitudes about health care: Pew Research Center, “Millennials.”
SIX: OF US, BY US, AND FOR US
233 Mitt Romney on 47 percent of Americans: Romney was speaking
at a private fund-­raiser in Florida on May 17, 2012, when he said:
“There are 47 percent of the p­ eople who will vote for the president
no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him,
who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are
victims, who believe that government has a responsibility to care
for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food,
to housing, to you name it. That that’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. . . . These are p­ eople who pay no
income tax.” See MoJo News Team.
234 Newt Gingrich on food stamps: Byers.
234 “That will kill the ability of America”: “Republican Candidates.”
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235 Finns and Americans receiving welfare: I’ll be the first to admit that
this comparison is not a fair measurement of the overall social assistance Finland and the United States offer their residents. Finland,
for example, sends automatic monthly child benefits to all families
with children. Rather, I am making a point here about negative
views of the “welfare” state. The comparison is based on the 381,851
Finns receiving toimeentulotuki and the 47.7 million Americans receiving food stamps in 2013. See Congressional Budget Office, Supplemental; Virtanen.
237 Finns and Americans employed: Employment rates are calculated
as the ratio of the employed to the working-­age population (aged
fifteen to sixty-­four). Employed p­ eople are defined as those who
report that they have worked in gainful employment for at least one
hour in the previous week or who had a job but were absent from
work during the reference week. In 2010–2012, 69 percent of Finns
were thus employed, as opposed to 67 percent of Americans. Other
Nordic countries did even better: Iceland 79 percent, Norway 76
percent, Sweden and Denmark both 73 percent. See OECD, OECD
Factbook, 132–133.
237 New York Times article on Chisago County: Appelbaum.
238 Distribution of American household income and benefits: Congressional Budget Office, Trends 3, 21.
238 Submerged state: While Social Security benefits are delivered as
government checks, Suzanne Mettler notes even that program was
deliberately fashioned by the Roosevelt Administration to resemble
private insurance, which makes its status as a government social
program less than obvious to some beneficiaries. In Mettler’s study,
44 percent of recipients of Social Security payments said that they
had not used a government program, as did 52 percent of the respondents who had claimed the child care tax credit, 47 percent of
those who had taken Earned Income Tax Credit, and 64 percent of
those who had employer-­sponsored and thus tax-­exempted health
insurance. The same applied to 43 percent of recipients of unemployment benefits, and 40 percent of p­ eople on Medicare. Mettler.
241 Iceland’s banking crisis: Icelandic Parliament.
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242 Competitiveness, freedom and state of Nordic economies: Miller;
OECD Economic Surveys for Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway,
and Sweden; Schwab, Global Competitiveness Report 2015–2016.
243 Finland’s economy during and after the euro crisis: Arnold, Finland;
Irwin; Krugman, “Annoying”; Milne; Moody’s; Moulds; O’Brien,
The Euro and Why; Standard and Poor’s, “Finland.”
243 Government debt, GDP, and deficits in different countries: OECD,
Government, 58–59, 62–63; OECD, National, 25.
246 Congress vs. cockroaches: Public Policy Polling.
246 Hobbes and human wars: Hobbes, 56, 81.
246 Rousseau and human laws: Rousseau.
247 Mill on freedom: Mill.
248 Alexis de Tocqueville and American democracy: Tocqueville.
248 “How could you judge” and “Wasn’t a state”: Micklethwait, 48, 56.
248 Smith and the invisible hand: Smith.
250 “Put simply”: Micklethwait, 87.
251 A third of Americans believe armed rebellion is necessary: Farleigh.
252 The author’s personal taxes in Finland and the United States in 2011:
Technically, the parental leaves and sick days of Finnish entrepreneurs are not paid for by taxes. Rather, all self-employed workers
are required by law to buy entrepreneur’s pension insurance, which
covers these benefits, as well as social security payments. However,
these payments are approximately equivalent to American self-­
employment tax, and thus they are included in these calculations.
252 The tax rates of the Romneys and the Obamas: Confessore; Leonhardt; Mullins; White House Office, President Obama.
254 Taxation in different countries: Lindbeck, 1297–98, 1301; OECD,
Consumption chap. 5, 34–35, 120–30, 134, 140; OECD, OECD Factbook, 230–231; OECD, “Table 1.7”; OECD, Taxing, 19–24, 45, 129,
546; Tax Policy Center, “Historical.”
256 Top marginal tax rates in different countries: OECD, “Table 1.7.”
256 Income distribution in the United States: Tax Policy Center, “Distribution.”
256 Americans support higher taxes on the wealthy: Newport;
Ohlemacher; Parker, “Yes”; Steinhauser.
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359
256 “The effective tax rate for the wealthiest”: Senate.
257 Buffett, King, and Obama on their tax rates: Buffett, “A Minimum”
and “Stop”; King; Lander.
258 Danish “flexicurity”: Andersen.
258 The Swedish economy and budget rules: In 2015 the Swedish government announced that it would like to see the budget surplus rule
dropped since the country’s finances were stable and it would free
money for investments. The discussion was ongoing at the time of
writing. Duxbury; Regeringskansliet; OECD. OECD Economic
Surveys: Sweden.
259 Government spending per GDP and efficiency in arranging ser­
vices: Adema; OECD, Government, 70–71.
261 Proposals and efforts for smarter government in the United States:
Paul Blumenthal; Chappell; Dorment; Education Week; Kaiser; National Conference, Redistricting, State Family, and State Minimum;
National Employment Law Project, “City”; Teles; United for the
­People; White House Office, “White House Unveils”; Employment
Development.
261 Proposals for tax reform: Brundage; Buffett, “A Minimum”; Krugman, “Taxes”; Nixon; Norris; White House, Reforming.
SEVEN: THE LANDS OF OPPORTUNITY
265 Hedge fund managers made almost one billion: According to Forbes
the twenty-­five highest-­earning hedge fund managers made $24.3
billion in 2013, while Institutional Investor’s Alpha put that number
at $21.15 billion. One billion each is the average—­some made more,
some less. To get into the top twenty-­five, you had to make about
$300 million. See Taub; Vardi.
265 American median income: DeNavas-­Walt and Proctor, 5.
265 The homeless in New York: Feuer; Stewart.
266 Income inequality in the United States: Congressional Budget
Office, Trends; Krugman, “The Undeserving”; National Employment Law Project, “Occupational”; Saez; Yellen.
266 Explanations for rising inequality: Frank; OECD, Divided, 28–41.
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267 Americans prefer Swedish income distribution: Norton.
269 Income inequality, equality of opportunity and social mobility:
Chetty; Corak, “Do Poor” and “Income Inequality”; Hertz; Jäntti;
OECD, Growing Unequal; Pickett; interview with Markus Jäntti
(Sept. 29, 2013.)
270 Ed Miliband on the American dream: Miliband.
270 Finnish school reform and social mobility: One study found that
dispensing with separate tracks and creating a unified public school
in Finland diminished the correlation between sons’ and fathers’
incomes by a quarter. See Pekkarinen.
274 Middle-­class incomes in the United States and other countries:
DeNavas-­Walt and Proctor, 23; Leonhardt and Quealy.
275 OECD recommendations for countering inequality: OECD, Divided, 18–19.
275 Americans view inequality as the greatest threat: Pew Research
Center, “Middle Easterners.”
275 American states and cities raising the minimum wage: National
Conference, State Minimum; National Employment Law Project,
“City.”
275 Krugman on the rich paying taxes: Krugman, “Now That’s.”
275 Stiglitz on Nordic countries: Stiglitz.
276 Wealth and happiness: Lewis.
EIGHT: BUSINESS AS UNUSUAL
281 Supercell: Interview with Ilkka Paananen (Oct. 23, 2013); Junkkari;
Kelly; Reuters; Saarinen, “Hurjaa” and “Supercell-­miljonäärit”;
Scott, “SoftBank” and “Supercell Revenue”; Wingfield.
284 Wall Street Journal on Acne Studios: Yager.
285 KONE and elevator innovation: Full disclosure: The author of this
book received a nonfiction writing grant from the KONE Foundation. The foundation is independent from the company and gives
out more than 20 million euros annually to promote Finnish research, arts, and culture.
286 KONE and skyscrapers: Davidson; Economist.
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287 Ease of doing business in different countries: World Bank.
288 Ease of laying off employees in different countries: OECD, Employment, 78.
289 Minimum wages and fast-­food chains: In August 2015 a Big Mac in
Finland cost €4.10 while in the United States the average price was
$4.80. The exchange rate at the time put the Finnish Big Mac at the
equivalent of $4.60. See Alderman; Allegretto.
292 Executive pay in Nordic countries: Pollard.
294 GDP per hours worked, total hours worked per worker and employment rates in different countries: OECD, OECD Compendium,
23, Hours, and OECD Factbook, 132–133.
295 H&M’s parental leave policy: Hansegard.
296 “An individual employer may be”: Economic Report of the President
129, 132.
296 Family-­friendly policies benefit employers: Bassanini 11; Huffington, Beyond; OECD, Babies, 24; World Economic Forum, Global
Gender (2013), 31.
297 Employers’ reluctance to offer better work-­life balance: University
of Cambridge.
297 “There is nobody in this country who got rich”: Real Clear Politics.
300 Road deaths in different countries: International Transport, 22.
300 Linus Torvalds: Rivlin.
NINE: THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS
305 “Normally, I avoid clichés like the plague”: Wellesley.
306 American views about a successful life: Bowman, 17; Futures;
Weissbourd.
314 “Parents seem to be increasingly anxious”: Tugend.
316 Americans would like to work less: Delaney; Rampell.
318 Downsides of optimism: Ehrenreich; Oettingen.
321 Testing four-­year-­olds: Many kindergartens in New York City
admit students based on their performance on a standardized test.
See Senior.
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Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 398
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INDEX
Aalto, Alvar, 14
Aalto University, Helsinki, 79
Abba, 6
Abrams, Samuel, 151–52
Accel Partners, 281–82
Acne Studios, 284–85, 286
Ally McBeal (TV show), 35
American dream, 5, 18, 49, 263–77,
297, 298, 323
Nordic dream vs. 49, 50
in trouble, 25–26
American Enterprise Institute, 150
Angry Birds (game), 5, 282
anxiety, 164–65, 311–12, 315
author’s, 19–24, 25, 168, 175
Nordic lack of stress, 320, 321
in U.S., 328
Appelbaum, Eileen, 103
Australia, 172
Austria, 351n156
baby box, 78–81
baby shower, 80
Banerjee, Abhijit V., 120, 121–23
Beckham, David, 27, 341n27
Belgium, 172, 254
Berggren, Henrik, 50, 56
Beveridge, William, 171, 249
“Bitter Pill: Why Medical Bills Are
Killing Us” (Brill), 191, 194,
227–28
Blitzer, Wolf, 229
Blue Is the Warmest Color (film), 132
Bold and the Beautiful, The (TV
show), 34
boomerang kids, 81–83
Breaking Bad (TV show), 232
Brill, Steven, 191, 194, 198, 227–28
Britain. See United Kingdom
Brooks, David, 60–61
Buffett, Warren, 256–57, 261
Burkina Faso, 173, 174, 175
Bush, George W., 349n136
business, 279–304. See also innovation; parental leave; vacations;
Supercell; Novo Nordisk; specific
companies
addressing climate change, 299
administration costs, 282
employee retention, 282–83
employer gains from family-­
friendly measures, 296
entrepreneurs, 177, 252, 257, 268,
280, 282, 284, 285, 287–88, 293,
302, 327, 258n252
Finland’s government investment
in, 281, 284
flexible workplace, 293–97
human capital for, 287
innovation, 285–88, 297–98
minimum wage, 250, 260, 275,
288–89, 361n289
motivation in, 298–304
Nordic model, 285, 287
|
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 399
399
4/25/16 1:53 PM
400
|
INDEX
business (continued)
Nordic ranking, 286–87
quality of life and, 292, 294, 297
risk reduction, 287, 293
social benefits and, 282, 283, 286,
294–95
start-­ups, 279–80, 282
taxes and, 282, 292–93
worker productivity, 294, 296
worker protections, 285, 287–88
California, paid family leave, 66, 102,
103
Cambodia, 173, 174
Cameron, David, 6
Canada, 172, 173, 227, 274
Carey, Kevin, 158–59
Carlsberg, 285
cell phones, 20, 340–41n20
Cheng, Tsung-­Mei, 208
child care. See day care; parental leave
Child Care Aware, 99
children, 6, 57. See also day care; education; parental leave
age of legal adulthood, 32, 48
baby box, 78–81
baby shower, 80
basic human rights of, 77, 78
boomerang kids, 81–83
breast-­feeding, 92
commitment to, Nordic region, 76,
88, 117, 118, 143
cost of having, U.S., 106
dominance of child, U.S., 30
family support model, 82–83
“free-­range” kids, 126–31
fresh air and exercise, 129
independence of, 58, 80, 81–82
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 400
as investment in society, 77–78
over-­scheduled child, 30
parent-­child relationships, 30–32,
50, 82–83, 92–93
parenting by fathers, 95
play, 131
poverty and, 124, 125
schools’ involvement in pupils’
lives, 143, 144
in single-­parent families, 85–86, 87,
88, 89
social benefits and policies, Nordic
countries, 86, 88, 89
transition to adulthood, 82
U.S. ranking, well-­being of, 57
climate change, 299
Clinton, Bill, 1–3, 7, 261, 329
Clinton Global Initiative Conference
(2010), 1–3
college. See university education
Coming Up Short: Working-­Class
Adulthood in an Age of Uncertainty (Silva), 90
Commonwealth Fund reports on
health care, 185, 187, 191, 198,
222
communism, 55, 299
Conrad, Kent, 256
Copenhagen, Denmark, 82, 289
carbon-­neutral goals, 299
“forest kindergartens,” 129
Noma restaurant, 6
Corak, Miles, 269, 270
Corson, Trevor, 11–14, 15, 17, 26, 35,
40, 48, 107, 164–65, 171, 175, 323,
331–32
employer-­based health care and,
181–83, 197, 206
4/25/16 1:53 PM
INDEX
Craig, Daniel, 301
creative arts, 300–304
school curriculum, 109, 118, 140,
141, 142, 154
credit cards, 20, 340n20
Danish Broadcasting Corporation
(DR), 301–4
Darling-­Hammond, Linda, 141–42
day care, 98–100, 126–31, 315
costs, 64, 99, 126, 342n64
Nordic, 27, 55–56, 74–76, 77,
98–100, 128–31, 343–44n74
staff, 130–31, 348n131
unpaid parental leave and, 38–39,
54
U.S., 39, 54, 64, 65, 74, 98–100, 131
de Blasio, Bill, 128, 300
DeLauro, Rosa, 103
Democracy in America (Tocqueville),
247, 260
Denmark, 5, 8, 339–40n5
addressing climate change, 299
business-­friendly ranking, 287
childbirth in, 71
cultural achievements, 6
early childhood learning, 128
education cost per student, 156
employment rate, 357n237
“flexicurity” system, 258, 292
“forest kindergartens,” 129
global financial crisis and, 241
happiness of ­people, 4
health care, 171, 206
The Killing, 6, 301, 303
national debt, 243
Novo Nordisk, 289–93
out-­of-­wedlock births, 87
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 401
|
401
parental leave, 345n94
social mobility in, 276
social ser­vices, costs, 259
taxes, 254, 256, 292
wages, 288–89
dependency, 27–45
autonomy as Nordic ideal, 31–32,
48, 51–53, 56
education to combat, 116
effects of, 51
elderly and, 31, 58–59, 213–14
on employers, 29, 40–43, 176–83,
287
on family and community, 28, 29,
82–83, 180
on government, 43–45, 233,
240–41, 356n233
marriage and, 34–40, 180
“nanny state” and, 7, 42, 53, 79,
233
parent-­child relationship, 30–33,
50, 155
U.S. and, 28, 29, 36
depression, 7, 318
Digital Chocolate, 282
disability insurance, 64, 66, 235
divorce, 22, 93
Doctored: The Disillusionment of an
American Physician (Jauhar),
187–88
Duflo, Esther, 120, 121–23
Dwight School, New York City, 117,
119
Economic Report of the President
(2013), 102, 296
Economist, The, 7, 247–48, 258
“The Next Supermodel,” 6
4/25/16 1:53 PM
4 02
|
INDEX
economy
Eurozone crisis, 8, 241
family-­friendly policies and economic growth, 105
Finland, 8, 140, 156
flexible work and, 178
“the Great Gatsby Curve,” 269
Great Recession and, 8, 241
knowledge-­based, 165
Nordic budget deficits, 243
Nordic countries, ranking, 242
Nordic region cycles, 241–42
Nordic social policies and, 241
U.S. economic stagnation, 266
U.S. incomes, 256, 265, 266, 274
U.S. money worries, 274–77
U.S. rising costs, 274–75
U.S. wealth gap, 265–66
education, 107–66, 315
accountability, 139
administration, 156
after-­school programs, 141, 144–45,
272, 350n145
age to begin school, 128
arts curriculum, 109, 118, 140, 141,
142, 154
Banerjee/Duflo research, 120
building cognitive muscle, 141–42
charter schools, 110–11, 152–53
childhood poverty and, 124–25
competition vs. cooperation,
145–47, 166
core curriculum and, 118, 137
cost per student, 155–57
“demand” approach, 120–21
deterioration of U.S., 270–71
disconnect between incentive and
reward, 121
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 402
early childhood, 77, 126–31, 270
example, search for U.S. quality
schools, 108–9
example, starting school in Finland, 163
family residence and, 39
in Finland, 3, 27, 112–13, 117, 120,
126, 151–53, 154, 162, 236, 270,
271, 272
Finland vs. U.S., 147–48
free, 17, 56, 82
funding and costs, 153–57, 351n156
highest-­ranked countries, 112
homework, 113, 143–44
inequality in, 111, 123–24, 125, 155,
164–65, 270–71
kindergarten, 129, 361n321
No Child Left Behind, 349n136
Nordic approach, 121, 123, 136, 143
in Norway, 152
parental anxiety and, 110
parental involvement in, 30,
148–50, 163, 341n30
PISA ranking, 112, 142
policies developed by American
educators, 157
preschool, 128, 131
purpose of, 141, 159, 165
school and class size, 143
school lunches, 176, 237, 240
school readiness, 131, 361n321
school vouchers, 121
social mobility and, 270–71,
360n270
standardized testing, 108, 109,
111, 121, 136, 138–42, 145, 149,
150, 152, 156, 162, 321, 349n136,
349n139, 361n321
4/25/16 1:53 PM
INDEX
STEM subjects, 141
student stipends, 82
“supply” approach, 122–23
in Sweden, 121, 152–53
teachers, 132–40, 145, 162
team sports, 146
testing, non-­standardized, 138
tutoring and, 144
U.S., state control, 151
U.S., 25–26, 33, 39, 108–9, 110, 118,
121, 123, 270
U.S. advantages, 165, 166
U.S. ranking globally, 112
U.S. reforms, 119, 132–33, 136
U.S. testing costs, 139
what should be taught, 140–42
Ehrenreich, Barbara, 318
elder care
by family, 31, 33, 214–15, 217–18
Nordic approach, 31, 56, 58–59, 216
nursing homes, 214, 217
U.S., lack of quality, 33
U.S. retirement cost, 214
U.S. vs. Nordic approaches, 213–18
employment, 29. See also parental
leave
attitudes toward, Nordic vs. U.S.,
97
career vs. at-­home mom, 97–98
dependency and, 29, 40–43,
176–83, 287
decline of lifetime jobs, 60
family, medical, or maternity leave,
63–67, 76, 101, 102, 104, 105
fear of job loss, 41–42
flexible workplace, 293–96
“flexicurity” system, 258, 292
gender equality and, 296–97
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 403
|
403
health care and, 172, 173, 176–83,
221–22, 228 (see also health care)
incentives to work, 88
knowledge-­based, 115
living wages, 315
minimum wage, 250, 288–89
Nordic, social ser­vices separate
from employment, 42–43
part-­time and low-­paying, 266
parental leave (see parental leave)
rate of employment, U.S. vs. Finland, 235, 357n237
sick days, 66, 67, 77, 86, 103, 252,
296, 340n17, 358n252
unemployment benefits, 82, 84,
244, 259, 292, 357n238
U.S. employee-­employer relationship, 40–43
vacation days, 17, 26, 41, 42, 64, 65,
67, 76, 77, 283, 289, 294, 295, 296,
312, 315, 316
wages, fast food industry, 275,
288–89
women and, 98, 105, 346n98
worker commitment, 290
worker protections, 287–88, 340n17
worker satisfaction, 61
working hours, 41, 42, 63–64, 193,
250, 289, 295, 316
entrepreneurs
Finland insurance for, 358n252
in Nordic countries, 23, 177, 252,
268, 285, 287–88, 293, 302
Paananen as, 281
risk and, 177
Schiller as, 284
taxes and, 257, 285
in U.S., 8, 16, 166, 280, 282, 311, 327
4/25/16 1:53 PM
404
|
INDEX
Ericsson, 285
Estonia, 285
European Union (EU), 105, 241,
242–43
Facebook, 102
Factory, 284
family, 6, 63–106, 180. See also
children; day care; elder care;
parental leave
boomerang kids and, 81–83
family leave, 66–67, 76, 101, 102,
104, 105
modernity and, 27–28, 90–91
money and access to money, impact
of, 39–40
Nordic ideal, 58
Nordic supportive social policies
and, 86–87, 89, 91–96, 101
sacrifices demanded of U.S. families, 180
supermoms, 96–102
unmarried partners and, 87–90
U.S., 29–31, 39, 43, 82–83, 101, 180
U.S. path to addressing the challenges of, 102–6
women’s role in, 39–40, 91–96
Family Act, 103
fast-­food industry, 275, 288–89,
361n289
Finland, 3–5, 7, 8, 15, 34
baby box, 78–81
as best country, ranking, 3–4, 6, 8,
26, 27
business advantages, 281, 287
cell phones, 20, 340–41n20
childhood, 128–29
child poverty rate, 124
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 404
child rearing and child care, 27,
31–32, 33, 73–74, 92, 95–96, 117,
118, 345n92
cultural achievements, 14
day care centers, 128–31, 348n131
doctors in, 193–94, 203
drug costs, 200, 213, 353n184
economy, 8, 140, 156, 242–43
education, 3, 27, 109–18, 120, 123,
126, 128, 137, 140–47, 151–57,
162, 236, 270–72, 347n117,
350n145, 351n156, 352n160
elder care, 217
engagement/wedding rings, 36
equality of opportunity and, 160,
161, 163–64, 166, 236
equalization of gender roles, 91
as EU member, 241–43
family, 29
family planning, 105–6
Finnish character, 8, 15, 56–57,
311
geography of, 14
Great Recession and, 8
habit of conformity, 307–8
happiness of ­people, 4, 8
health care, 16, 27, 70, 171, 183–88,
190, 206, 207, 208–13, 225–26,
343n70, 353n184
history, 54
ice hockey, 147
income inequality in, 125
knowledge-­based businesses, 115,
123
language of, 234, 339–40n5
maternity benefits/pay, 88
medical leave, 16, 340n17
middle class, 16, 26
4/25/16 1:53 PM
INDEX
monthly child support, 239
national debt, 243
National Matriculation Exam,
138–39, 146
natural resources, 244–45
negativity and, 316, 319–20
out-­of-­wedlock births, 87
parental leave, 17, 27, 73, 94,
98, 235–36, 272, 292, 340n17,
343n73
PISA ranking, 112, 142
policy of “positive discrimination,”
154
population, 150, 151, 342n55
post–World War II, 113
prenatal care, birth, and post-­natal
care, 67–71
“pupil welfare teams,” 144
quality of life, 27
retirement funds, 255
sisu (grit), 15–16
social benefits, 68–69, 88, 240, 254,
259, 272
socialism and, 54–55
social mobility, 5, 276, 360n270
standard of living, 68–69
start-­ups in, 140
taxes, 36, 154, 160, 235–36, 240,
254, 256, 282
teachers, 130–35, 139, 349n139
university education, 17, 138,
158–61, 236, 352n160
vacations and, 17, 76
wages, 288–89, 361n289
wealth in, 274, 276
welfare, 234
“well-­being” state, 234, 235–36
women, appearance and, 34
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 405
|
405
work-­life balance, 4, 26
World War II, 54, 342n54, 342n55
“Finland’s ‘Baby Box’: Gift from
Santa Claus or Socialist Hell?”
(Tierney), 78
Finnish First (film), 156
Finnish Lessons: What Can the World
Learn from Educational Change in
Finland? (Sahlberg), 119
Forman, Milos, 354n205
Fourth Revolution, The: The Global
Race to Reinvent the State (Micklethwait and Wooldridge), 248,
250
France, 185, 187, 191
freedom, 320–27
free-­market capitalism, 59–60, 244,
248, 266, 299
Friedman, Milton, 42
Fugitive Crosses His Tracks, A (Sandemose), 307
Fund for Peace, 5
Gates, Melinda, 1
gender equality, 59, 91, 93, 97, 130,
296–97
Germany, 172, 185, 254
Gillibrand, Kirsten, 103
Girls (TV show), 32
Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The
(Larsson), 6, 15, 301
Global Competitiveness Report, 4
Google, 66, 102
government
bigger vs. smaller, 60
dependency on, 7, 42, 43–45
in Nordic countries, 276
purpose of, 240, 284
4/25/16 1:53 PM
406
|
INDEX
government (continued)
smart government vs. big government, 245–51, 268
social benefits provided by, 16, 17,
27, 42–43, 233–45 (see also specific
benefits)
spending, 259–61
Sweden, 258–59
U.S., 60, 245–46, 250, 257–61
U.S. Founding Fathers, 247
Webb’s vision for society, 249
H&M, 6, 285, 295
Halonen, Tarja, 1–3, 6, 14, 87–88, 329
happiness, 305–29
of children, 78
education access and, 248
Finland ranking, 4
freedom and, 320–27
human spirit and, 298
“nanny state” criticism and, 7
Nordic region, 5, 304
optimists vs. pessimists, 316–20
pressure to achieve and, 313–15
“well-­being” state and, 235, 304
work as source of, 312–13
workplace practices and, 207, 292,
294
World Happiness Report, 4, 5
Harris, Angel L., 150
Healing of America, The: A Global
Quest for Better, Cheaper, and
Fairer Health Care (Reid),
172–73
health care, 201–3, 352n160, 353n174
American in Finland, experience
of, 209–13
as basic human right, 175, 199
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 406
Beveridge model (socialized medicine), 171–72, 185, 249
Bismarck model, 172, 187
cancer and, 186–87, 222–26
childbirth costs, 38, 64–65, 70, 190,
188, 192, 202
COBRA insurance, 177
community and, 229–32
costs, U.S. vs. Nordic countries, 38,
188–95
death panels, 195–96
doctors, U.S. vs. Finnish, 193–94,
203, 228–29
drug costs, 172, 184, 191, 192,
212–13, 227–28
employer-­based, 41, 43, 173,
176–83, 222
hospital stays comparison, 191
inequality in, 270
Medicaid, 173–74, 220, 239, 240–41
medical or maternity leave, 16,
63–64
Medicare, 173, 213–14, 220, 228,
239, 261
Medicare-­for-­all plans, 226
National Health Insurance model,
172
“no model” countries, 172–73
Nordic, waiting period, 185
Nordic private clinics, 177, 184
ObamaCare, 57, 178–79, 189–90,
196, 218–20, 226, 228
personal bankruptcy and costs, 170,
174
prenatal care, 63, 64–65, 67–71,
343n70
private for-­profit insurers, 173, 178,
197–99, 230–31
4/25/16 1:53 PM
INDEX
quality of, Nordic vs. U.S., 183–88,
190
right to choose doctors, 204–7
“single-­payer” system, 172
transparency in, 196–201
“Universal Laws of Health Care
Systems,” 208
universal public health care, 16, 27,
42–43, 55, 58, 167–232, 240, 249,
315
in U.S., 25, 57, 170–71, 173–83,
192–93 198, 201–3, 219, 353n173
U.S., how it could switch to
universal public health care,
226–29
U.S., uninsured or underinsured
citizens, 25, 168–70, 173, 174,
175–76, 177, 189, 341n25
U.S. health care profits, 194
U.S. spending on, 190–91, 221–22
U.S. statistics, 186
U.S. Veterans Health Administration, 174, 220
Heinonen, Kristin, 294
Helsingin Sanomat, 6
Helsinki, Finland, 4, 6, 12, 279
Supercell company in, 279–80
Hess, Frederick M., 150
Hobbes, Thomas, 246
housing
homelessness, 263–64, 265
Nordic subsidies, 82
student, 160, 252n160
“How to Land Your Kid in Therapy”
(Atlantic), 33
“How to Succeed in Fashion Without
Trying Too Hard” (Wall Street
Journal), 284
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 407
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4 07
Huffington, Arianna, 315–16
human spirit, 298–304
Iceland, 5, 241
health care, 171
parental leave, 3+3+3 model, 94
Ikea, 6, 285, 292
income inequality, 25, 84, 125,
250, 263–68, 269, 270, 274,
275
hedge fund managers, average
earnings, 265, 359n265
Nordic road map for dealing with,
275–76
India, 121, 173
individualism, 50, 51, 56, 58, 60,
308
Nordic model and, 298, 328–29
social policies and, 328–29
innovation, 285–98. See also entrepreneurs
climate change and, 299
creative arts, 300–304
employer gains from family-­
friendly measures, 296
Finland ranking, 4
global technology sector, 300
Nordic crime novels, 286, 301
Nordic design, 286
Nordic social policies and, 286, 293,
302–3
Nordic TV shows, 286, 301–4
Nordic “well-­being state” and,
297–98, 302–4
online gaming, 286
traffic safety, 300
U.S. leadership in, 293
Innovation Scoreboard, 4
4/25/16 1:53 PM
408
|
INDEX
International School of Helsinki,
347n117
Ireland, 87, 190
Jäntti, Markus, 269
Japan, health care, 172
Jauhar, Sandeep, 187–88
Johnson, Lyndon B., 250
Kaiser Family Foundation, 182
Kamprad, Ingvar, 292–93
Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, 158
Kela (Social Security Institution of
Finland), 343n73, 353n184
Killing, The (crime drama), 6, 301,
303
King, Stephen, 256–57
KONE, 285–86
KONE Foundation, 360n285
Korea, 144
Krueger, Alan, 269
Krugman, Paul, 275
labor unions, 60, 139, 266, 288,
349n139
Lammi, Finland, 209–10
Larsson, Stieg, 6, 15, 301
Lassen, Chris­tian, 290–93
Law of Jante, 307, 310
Lean In (Sandberg), 97
Legal Momentum, 86
LEGOs, 6, 285
Leviathan (Hobbes), 246
libertarianism, 299, 320, 321, 326
Lincoln, Abraham, 247
Lindgren, Astrid, 47, 49
Linux, 300
Luxembourg, 351n156
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 408
Maersk, 285
Malene Birger, 286
Marimekko, 14, 286
marriage, 34–40, 83–91
as casualty of dependence on
family, 83
causes of decline in, 89–90
children and, 38–39, 88
commitment and, 34–35
engagement ring, 35–36
financial commingling, 36–40
as financial solution, 84–85
gender roles and, 93
individual self-­sufficiency and, 89,
91, 93
modernity and, 85, 87
Nordic perspective, 38, 85, 89
Nordic support structures, 40
resentment in, 40, 93
sacrifices that strain bonds, 89
U.S. lack of support structures, 40, 83
U.S. media portrayal of, 34, 35
maternity benefits, 38, 56, 88, 92. See
also women
Mayer, Marissa, 96
McCullough, David, Jr., 305–6, 310
McDonald, Bob, 1
mental illness, 263–64
Mettler, Suzanne, 238, 239, 357n238
Micklethwait, John, 248, 250, 258
Miliband, Ed, 5, 270
Milkman, Ruth, 103
Mill, John Stuart, 247, 248, 249
Minecraft video game, 286
minimum wage, 250, 260, 275,
288–89, 361n289
modernity, 53–62
family and, 58
4/25/16 1:53 PM
INDEX
marriage and, 85, 87
in Nordic region, 44–45, 87, 90–91
in U.S., 28, 44, 90
Mojang, 286
Monocle magazine, 4
MySQL, 300
“nanny state,” 7, 42, 53, 79, 233
initiative, innovation and, 280,
298–304
National Institutes of Mental Health
(NIMH), 24
Neander-­Nilsson, Sanfrid, 49
Netherlands, 185, 274
New America Foundation, 158
Newman, Katherine S., 81, 87
Newsweek: Finland tops best country
survey, 3–4, 6, 8, 26, 27
New York Times: series on health-­care
costs, 191, 192–93
New Zealand, 191
“No Child Left Behind,” 349n136
Nokia, 14, 140, 242–43, 285
Nordic region, 5, 80, 339–40n5
American criticism of, 23
Beveridge model of health care,
171–72
budget deficits in, 243
character of ­people, 49–50
culture, 6, 301–2
dark aspects of, 15
economies of, 6, 55, 61, 241–45
embracing the future in, 258
freedom in, 55, 61–62, 320–27
free-­market capitalism, 55, 59–60
gender gap, 100–101
GDPs, 23
government’s role, 44–45, 276
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 409
|
409
happiness of ­people, 4, 305–29
incentives to work, 88
individualism in, 50, 55, 56, 58,
90–91
Law of Jante, 307–8, 310
marriage and, 38, 40
middle class in, 245
modernity and, 44–45, 53–62, 87,
90–91
nudity and sexuality in, 132
parent-­child relationships, 31
quality of life, 50, 55, 61, 218, 257,
292
rankings of, 5
rate of employment, 178 357n237
rates of depression, alcoholism, and
suicide, 7, 317
road map for dealing with income
inequality, 275–76
romanticism in, 85
“Scandinavian moment,” 6
self-­interest and, 56
social contract, 50, 53, 55, 61, 76
as “socialist nanny states,” 7, 42, 53,
79, 233
social mobility, 268–74, 276
social welfare programs, 16, 66,
177, 234–37 (see also specific benefits)
stability, 62
success of, 44, 50–52, 53, 59, 62,
140, 209, 245, 259, 268, 277, 298,
304
surpassing the U.S., 8–9
taxes 252, 253, 254, 255–56
theory of love, 45, 47–62
U.S. as inspirational for, 8
values, 51, 53
4/25/16 1:53 PM
41 0
|
INDEX
Nordic region (continued)
as “well-­being” state, 4, 234–36,
240, 245, 297, 298, 300, 303, 304
women’s independence and, 38
Nordic theory of everything (Nordic
theory of love), 50–53, 58, 59, 61
American version, 103
baby box and, 79
basic tenets, 267, 277, 287
birth of a baby and, 67–72
business model, 281
child care and work hours, 76
children held to high standards,
138
commitment to children, 118
day care and, 74–76
defined, 50
economic health and, 243–44
education and, 113–17, 121, 123,
136, 143, 163
elder care and, 216
equality and, 120
family and, 86–87, 89, 106
independence from parents and,
80, 81–82, 160
individual self-­realization and
personal autonomy, 89, 91, 93,
101, 116, 138, 143, 148, 160, 181,
205, 319, 322
marriage and independence of
each individual, 85–91, 180
paid vacations and, 76
parental leave and, 72–76, 91–96
parent-­child relationships, 83
social policies and, 273, 327
as a society investing in its ­people,
283–84
successful life and, 313–29
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 410
Trägårdh on, 320–21
women working, 105, 106
Nordic Way, The (Trägårdh and
Berggren), 58
Norway, 5, 8, 339–40n5
daddy-­only parental leave, 94
education, 152, 156, 351n156
elder care, 217
employer social security contributions, 254
“forest kindergartens,” 129
happiness of ­people, 4
health care, 171, 206
middle class, 274
national debt, 243
oil production, 23, 244
out-­of-­wedlock births, 87
parental leave, 72
ranking as business-­friendly, 287
rate of employment, 357n237
social mobility in, 276
social ser­vices, costs, 259
worker productivity, 294
Novo Nordisk, 285, 289–93
Obama, Barack, 55, 104, 121, 128, 228
education reform and, 349n136
social welfare programs, 234
taxes paid by, 252, 257
on U.S. best colleges, 158–59
Obama, Michelle, 131
ObamaCare (the Affordable Care
Act), 57, 178–79, 189–90, 196,
218–20, 226, 228
“Obama the Socialist? Not Even
Close” (Forman), 354n205
O’Brien, Conan, 14
Oettingen, Gabriele, 317–18, 320
4/25/16 1:53 PM
INDEX
On Liberty (Mill), 247
optimism, 316–20
Orava, Sakari, 341n27
Organization for Economic Co-­
operation and Development
(OECD), 4, 105, 112, 119, 130
average national debt and, 243
college graduate survey, 159
country rankings, 112, 145
government spending comparison,
259
midwives vs. doctors, 202
recommended remedies for restoring the middle class, 275
studies on health care, 186
tax rate comparison by, 253–54
U.S. doctors, tests ordered, 202
Paananen, Ilkka, 281–85
Palin, Sarah, 196
parental (family) leave, 91–96
as basic human right, 77
effect on employers, 290–92, 295
Finland’s, 17, 27, 98, 235–36, 272,
292, 340n17
funding for, 104, 291, 340n17
gender equality and, 93
Iceland’s 3+3+3 model, 94
ILO findings for maternity leave,
104
incentives to work and, 88, 89
Nordic, women in workforce and, 98
Nordic paid universal, 17, 27, 42,
66, 72–76, 92–94, 100, 340n17,
343–44n74
Nordic philosophy, 92–93
Nordic region, daddy-­only, 73, 92,
93–94, 95, 96, 345n94
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 411
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41 1
Nordic region, universal minimum
amount, 72
Sweden, 293–94
U.S., fathers and, 94–95
U.S. lack of, 38–39, 64–67, 96–97
U.S. states and companies instituting, 102
parenting. See also parental leave
breast feeding recommendation,
92, 345n92
dependency issues, 32–33
Finnish approach, 32, 92
helicopter parenting, 32, 81, 148
Nordic, encouraging fathers to be
active in, 73, 93, 94
Nordic, social supports, 160–61
Nordic goals, 52, 81–82, 148, 149
Nordic vs. U.S. styles, 148–49
parent-­child relationships, 30–31,
50, 341n31
strengthened relationship between
parents, 95–96
supermoms, 96–102
U.S., father’s role, 94–95
U.S., parental responsibility for
grown children, 30, 32, 48, 52
U.S., women as primary parent,
91–92
Paronen, Samuli, 145
Partanen, Anu
American citizenship, 331–33
anxiety and adjustment to U.S. life,
19–24, 25, 168, 175
decision to have children, 164–65
disadvantages of moving to the
U.S. for, 16–17
education of, 111, 142–43, 144,
350n143
4/25/16 1:53 PM
41 2
|
INDEX
Partanen, Anu (continued)
employer-­based health care and,
181–83, 197
engagement ring and, 35–36
extended family in the U.S., 107
as Finnish newspaper reporter, 6
health insurance hunt, 179–83
immigration to U.S., 6–7, 17–18
independence from parents and,
31–32
marriage in America, lack of support structures and, 40
meets future American husband
and marries, 11–13, 26
mother’s profession, 38
Pippi Longstocking books and,
47
right to choose doctors and, 205–6
sisu (grit) of, 15–16, 23
taxes, 251–52, 358n252
travel by, 13
Wyoming trip, 323
Paul, Ron, 229–30
“Paying till it hurts” (Rosenthal), 191
Perry, Rick, 251
Pew Research Center, 231
pharmaceutical industry, 33, 192, 227,
285, 290, 293
drug approval, 199–200
Novo Nordisk, 289–93
price regulation and, 199–200,
227–28
Pippi Longstocking books, 47–48, 49,
50, 51
Pomona College, California, 48–49
Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking
of the Way to Fight Global Poverty
(Banerjeee and Duflo), 120
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 412
poverty
childhood poverty, 124–25
health care and, 173–74
U.S. poor, 274
U.S. single mothers and, 86
Programme for International Student
Assessment (PISA), 112
country rankings, 112, 145
Finnish ranking, 142
investment in teachers and rankings, 135
study for university graduates, 159
Swedish ranking, 152
U.S. ranking, 112
Putin, Vladimir, 242–43
quality of life, 4, 5, 14
Finland, 27
happiness of ­people, 303–4, 315
Nordic countries, 50, 55, 61, 218,
257, 292
U.S. and, 5, 315, 326
workplace practices and, 292, 294,
297
Rand, Ayn, 299
Rather, Dan, 141, 156
Reagan, Ronald, 246, 250, 261
Reid, T. R., 171, 208
retirement funds, 255
“Rich, Happy and Good at Austerity”
(Financial Times)
Ripley, Amanda, 147, 148
Robinson, Keith, 150
Romney, Mitt, 121, 233–34, 252,
356n233
Roosevelt, Franklin D., 250
Rosenthal, Elisabeth, 191
4/25/16 1:53 PM
INDEX
Rostgaard, Tine, 217–18
Rousseau, Jean-­Jacques, 246
Rovio, 282, 286
Rubio, Marco, 84, 88
Russia, 242–43
Saarinen, Eero, 14
Sahlberg, Pasi, 117, 119, 131, 145, 162
Sandberg, Sheryl, 97
Sandemose, Aksel, 307
Save the Children, 57
Scandinavia, 5, 339n5. See also Nordic
region
Schiller, Mikael, 284–85
Schmidt, Eric, 1
Sex and the City (TV show), 35
Sibelius, Jean, 14
sick (medical) leave, 66, 67, 77, 86,
103–4, 252, 296, 340n17, 358n252
Sidwell Friends School, Washington,
DC, 341n30
Silva, Jennifer M., 90
Skijle,Jeanette, 295
small business. See also business;
entrepreneurs
health care and, 177
Nordic region, 177
U.S., lack of employee benefits or
protections, 65–66
Smartest Kids in the World, The
(Ripley), 147
Smith, Adam, 248–49
social benefits programs, 233–45, 259.
See also specific benefits
Denmark’s “flexicurity” system
and, 258, 292
dependency on government and,
233, 240–41, 356n233
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 413
|
41 3
economy and, 241
FDR’s New Deal, 250
Finland, as safety net when tragedy strikes, 271–73
food stamps, 234, 240
incentives to work and, 244
inequality in, 270
LBJ’s Great Society and War on
Poverty, 250
Nordic, pride in, 273
Nordic approach to, as well-­being
programs, 234–37, 240
Nordic costs, 259
Nordic economic health and,
241–45
Social Security, 103, 237, 239, 250,
252, 253, 261, 357n238, 358n252
stigmatizing, 240–41
survivor’s pension, 271–73
in U.S., as “the submerged state,”
238–40
U.S., Child and Dependent Care
Tax Credit, 239
U.S., Earned Income Tax Credit,
239
U.S. attitudes toward, 237–38
U.S. middle class and, 237–38
U.S. types of, 237
socialism, 54–55, 56, 137, 289, 299
employer-­dependent health care
and, 176
hidden, in U.S., 289
“socialized medicine,” 171–72
social mobility, 5, 83, 164, 268–74,
276, 323
education and, 270–71, 360n270
Social Security, 103, 237, 239, 250,
252, 253, 261, 357n238, 358n252
4/25/16 1:53 PM
41 4
|
INDEX
SoftBank, 279, 283
Space Systems Finland, 291
Spain, 190, 191
Spotify, 285
Stockholm, Sweden, 158, 284
Stora Enso, 286
success, 1, 6, 311–16
achievement-­based, 37, 311–13
American components, 313–15
in business, 279–97, 299, 302
in education, 107–13, 123, 126, 128,
146, 150–52
freedom and, 320–27
Nordic countries as successful, 44,
50, 53, 59, 62, 140, 209, 245, 259,
268, 277, 298, 304
opportunity for, 24, 29, 209, 235,
268, 269, 271, 273
optimists vs. pessimists, 316–20
suicide, 7, 317
Supercell company, 279–85, 286
management, 281
stock options, 280–81
workday, 281
Sveistrup, Søren, 302–4
Sweden, 5, 8, 339–40n5
budget surplus rule, 259, 359n259
childbirth in, 71–72
cultural achievements, 6
day care in, 76
distribution of wealth in, 267
early childhood learning and, 128
education and privatization, 121,
152–53
education cost per student, 156
elder care, 217
employer social security contributions, 254
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 414
flexibility in the workplace and,
293–94
global financial crisis and, 241
government, 258–59
health care, 171, 206–7
immigration and, 153, 308
individual self-­sufficiency and, 322
middle class in, 274
national debt, 243
out-­of-­wedlock births, 87
parental leave, 75–76, 94, 293–94
ranking as business-­friendly
nation, 287
rate of employment in, 357n237
social benefits programs, cost of,
259
Swedish character, 49–50, 308
tax rate, 253, 254
traffic safety, 300
Trägårdh and, 320–21
university education, 158
wealth in, 276
Switzerland
health care, 172, 191
school funding and costs, 351n156
Sylvius, Veera, 291
“Talent Society, The” (Brooks), 60
taxes, 251–57
author’s, Finland vs. U.S., 252,
358n252
benefits received from, 254–55, 257
“Buffett Rule,” 261
businesses and, 282, 283
Clinton administration, 261
on consumables, 254
Denmark, 292
fairness of, 255–56, 257, 284–85
4/25/16 1:53 PM
INDEX
Finland, 154, 160, 235–36, 240, 254,
282
“flat tax,” 253
health-­care system funded by,
230–31
on investment income, 261
Medicare tax, 253
Nordic, awareness of rationale for,
240
Nordic, benefits received from,
254–55
Nordic region, top marginal tax
rates, 256
Nordic separate taxation of
spouses, 36, 56
OECD comparison, 253–54
Perry’s proposed tax form, 251
property tax, 154–55, 255
Social Security tax, 253
Sweden, 253, 254
U.S., Child and Dependent Care
Tax Credit, 239
U.S., Earned Income Tax Credit,
239
U.S., favoring the wealthy, 266–67
U.S., health care and, 220
U.S., joint returns, 36
U.S., professional preparation of,
239
U.S., top marginal tax rate, 256
U.S., unfair taxes and big government, 257
U.S. vs. other countries, 251–52,
254
Teach for America, 135
technology
Nordic contributions, 300–301
open-­source software, 300–301
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 415
|
41 5
television
Bold and the Beautiful, The, 34
Danish Broadcasting Corporation,
301–4
Killing, The, 6, 301
portrayal of marriage, 34, 35
reality shows, 35
U.S. cable costs, 20–21
Tetra Pak, 285
Thatcher, Margaret, 250
Thompto, Guy, 205, 354n205
Thrive (Huffington), 315
Tierney, Dominic, 78, 79, 80
Tiistilä School, Espoo, Finland, 143,
144, 350n143
Times Higher Education magazine, 158
Tocqueville, Alexis de, 247, 260, 325
Torvalds, Linus, 300
Trägårdh, Lars, 48–49, 50–52, 56, 59,
60, 320–21
transportation, 89
public transportation, 272
subsidies, 352n160
traffic safety, 300
Tugend, Alina, 314
unemployment benefits, 82, 84, 259,
357n238,
costs, U.S. vs. Nordic, 259
“flexicurity” system and, 292
Nordic countries, 82, 244, 245, 292
training courses and, 84
U.S. submerged state, 238, 239
UNICEF
high marks for Finland day care,
130, 131
rating of child’s well-­being, 57
study on child poverty, 124
4/25/16 1:53 PM
41 6
|
INDEX
United Kingdom
Beveridge model of health care,
185, 206
health-­care, access to specialists,
185
health-­care costs, 191
National Health Ser­vice, 171
social mobility in, 269
standardized testing for schools,
121
United Nations ILO (International
Labour Organization), 104
United States, 18–24
American character, 15, 309, 321,
327–28
anachronistic new reality, 59–60,
90–91, 101, 161, 258, 267, 269
angst in, 24–25, 26, 33, 28, 328
being “special” and, 305–11
cell phones, 20, 340–41n20
child poverty rate, 124–25
college admitting process and,
30–31
complications of daily life, 20–21
education, 25–26, 33, 107–66
elder care, 31, 33, 213–18
epidemics, 22
factors in superiority of, 325–26
families, path to addressing the
problems of, 102–6
family in, 29–31
family policies, 103
family wealth and, 161
financial insecurity, 21–22, 24
freedom, independence, and
opportunity, 28, 61, 268–74, 277,
323–24
happiness of ­people, 308
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 416
health care (see health care)
ideals of, 332
ignorance of Nordic region, 7
income inequality in, 25, 84,
125, 263–68, 269, 270, 275–76,
359n265
as inspirational, 8
lack of consumer protection, 21
lack of maternity or medical leave,
world ranking and, 66
as lagging behind Nordic region,
8–9
Lehman Brothers collapse and
financial crisis, 17
loss of place in the world, 5–6
low ranking in children’s well-­
being, 57
men-­women relationships, 33–45
middle class in, 25, 237–38, 240–41,
274–77, 326
modernity and, 28, 44, 59–60
money worries, 274–77
as multicultural and diverse, 150 ,
309, 327
national debt, 243
natural beauty of, 327
optimism and, 316–20
parenting in, 30–33
personal freedom vs. the state,
53–54
population, 342n55
ranking as business-­friendly
nation, 287
ranking in Newsweek best country
survey, 4
resistance to family policies, 103–4
salary gap between men and
women, 101
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INDEX
self-­help gurus, 319
self-­realization and personal autonomy, 322–23
single-­person American households, 60
socialistic practices, 289
social mobility in, 5, 268–74, 276,
323
social welfare programs, 233–45,
259 (see also Social Security;
specific programs)
“the submerged state,” 238–40,
357n238
success in, 311–16
superachievers in, 311–15
taxes, 21, 251–52, 254
unaware of better conditions elsewhere, 9
young working-­class Americans,
obstacles to, 90
university education, 158–61
equality of opportunity and, 160,
161
Finland, 17, 138, 158–61, 236,
352n160
global rankings of, 158, 159
Nordic region, costs, 160
Nordic student autonomy and,
160–61
Nordic tuition-­free, 138, 160, 236,
255, 272, 295, 352n160
purpose of, 161
U.S. college applications, 30–31, 161
U.S. costs, 33, 39, 159–60, 351–
52n160
U.S. financial aid, 48–49, 52, 160
U.S. funding of, 161
U.S. top ranking in, 158, 159
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University of California, Berkeley, 161
University of Helsinki, Finland, 158,
159, 160
hospital associated with, 195
UPM, 286
vacation time, 295, 296
Nordic, four or five weeks paid, 17,
42, 76, 283, 289, 294, 315
in Sweden, 294
taken for medical or parental leave,
64, 65, 67
U.S., 41, 67, 312, 316
work-­life balance and, 26, 42, 77,
218, 296, 312
Vanity Fair magazine, 6
Volvo, 6, 285
Waiting for “Superman” (film), 133
Waldorf schools, 118
Warhol, Andy, 284
Warren, Elizabeth, 297
wealth inequality. See income inequality
Webb, Beatrice, 249
welfare
entitlements as, 356n233
food stamps as, U.S., 234
percent of population, Finland vs.
U.S., 234, 357n235
welfare as last resort (saada toimeentulotukea), 234
“welfare queens,” 88, 89, 233
“welfare state,” 235
Widenius, Monty, 300–301
women. See also parental leave
breast feeding recommendation,
92, 345n92
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INDEX
women (continued)
career vs. at-­home mom, 97–98
as caretakers for elderly, 215
childbirth approaches, 69, 71, 192,
202
childbirth costs, 38, 64–65, 70, 190,
188, 192, 202
child care and choices of, 98–100
difficulty in finding a spouse, 37
family responsibilities, 39–40
financial insecurity and, 24–25,
341n24
gap between men and women,
four categories measured,
100–101
gender equality, 59, 91, 93, 97,
296–97
government support for, 86, 100
medical or maternity leave, 63–65,
66, 92
Nordic, strength of, 91–96
Nordic social policies and, 86, 88,
92–93
prenatal care, 63, 64–65, 67–71,
343n70
single mothers, 60, 85–86, 89
strong U.S., image of, 33–34
supermoms, 96–102
Nordic_9780062316547_viii_424_4p_MB0425.indd 418
U.S., lost opportunities of, 101
in U.S., marriage and relationships, 33–45
U.S., parenting role, 91–92
U.S., unpaid work of, 92
U.S. vs. Nordic women, employment ambitions, 97
workforce participation, 6, 98, 105,
346n98
Wooldridge, Adrian, 248, 250, 258
work-­life balance, 4, 26
World Economic Forum
gap between men and women, four
categories measured, 100–101
paid parental leave policy and, 105
world financial crisis, 1, 17
World Happiness Report, 4, 5
World Health Organization (WHO):
breast feeding recommendation,
92, 345n92
World Values Survey, 322
Xanax, 24
Yahoo, 102
Yale University, 161
“You Are Not Special” (McCullough),
305–6, 310
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Anu Partanen’s work has appeared in the New York
Times and the Atlantic. A journalist in Helsinki for
many years, she has also worked at Fortune magazine
as a visiting reporter through the Innovation Journalism Fellowship at Stanford University. She lives
in New York City.
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